


Theorist

by Silverbulletsdeath



Category: Original Work
Genre: And I hardly remember what I wrote, Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, F/F, F/M, Gen, Hacker, I have no idea what this preference is called, M/M, Multi, Other, Paranoia, Post-Apocalypse, Prostitute, Prostitution, Sex, Sexual Content, Weird reactions to sex, abandoned work, don't read if you need trigger warnings, if it's a preference, mostly because I don't know what to use, seriously, sexual anxiety
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-16
Updated: 2016-06-14
Packaged: 2018-05-07 03:40:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 11
Words: 52,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5442053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silverbulletsdeath/pseuds/Silverbulletsdeath
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I was born into a rather well-to-do family, but since I was destined to be an accountant who couldn't figure out a spread sheet or do math (well, not simple math), I'm dirt poor.  See, in order to make money, and not end up either in the basement or back in my parent's care, I started writing, and then because the person I was writing for was sketchy, I learned how to hack in order to protect myself.  Also I might have given my resume to a "Homemade Stitches" 'cause I was always good at knitting (note to self: stitching places don't really make money selling little cute animals and knick-knacks, they're much less reputable than that.  Like "woopsie mister I seem to have forgotten my clothes").</p>
<p>Might not have been a problem, but Apparently the pimp, owner, whatever of the "Homemade Stitches" saw me do something a little illegal and needs a hacker.  Only problem, I can't pretend to be prostitute when I'm a terrified of sex. </p>
<p>Not that seems to bother the owner.  She just points out I gave her the resume and the government doesn't want a girl with college debts not able to pay her bills.  Then she laughs when I freak out and kick some poor guy in the nuts.  Sigh.  How is this my life?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Idealist

**Author's Note:**

> Seriously, I wrote this last nano month, and after a year of not correcting it, I hardly know what it's about, except that I can never get it published. It's just not good. Still, I put a lot of effort into writing it. And is the internet but a place to dump useless stuff onto other people. Maybe this will inspire something...
> 
> Why am I posting this again. 
> 
> Anyway. This does go into a whore house, so sex is talked about, and shown, though the character isn't normal, so this know this isn't an actual smut story. Not exactly anyway.
> 
> If you think of any tags I should add, please let me know. I may not use them, but since I don't remember everything about what I'm posting and am oblivious sometimes, then suggestions are appreciated, if not always used.

Running through down town was completely useless now.  I had so little money left.  All I had to do was run to my old apartment and secure myself inside.  There were still temptations, but I found it easy enough to not buy things when I couldn't see or touch them.  Actual physical things, that I could touch and called my name among the shoppers, yeah, I was a sucker.  Well, obviously.  Right now I standing in front of the cinema trying to get my feet to move.  The movie wasn't even my thing.  I liked the surreal, this was just some ridiculous action flick with some famous person from Crawl Street. 

I flipped out my purse, little crochet animals falling onto the street.  I sighed, almost expecting little flies to come from the zippers.  The chip I took out had just enough for the show and popcorn. 

It really shouldn't have been surprising when I ended up in line for a ticket.  The place was big.  With red felt drapes and oddly made stone figures.  I curled up, taking my phone out and hitting the buttons on the screen.  There was no red marks on the screen.  I'd gotten that once.  Turned out to be a virus, but it freaked me so bad my parents decided to spend a little extra to get me lessons on computing. 

Turned out that I wasn't half bad at it either.

"Hey, is that you Jennifer?" I looked behind me to see Rebecca.  We had been to High School together and been friends, of some sort anyway.  She was my friend at least, though she seemed to have much more friends to hang out with.  I smiled, not really interested in talking, though it was a while before the show started.  All I wanted to do was surph the net.  There had to be someone who needed me for a job. 

"Hello Rebecca," I said looking down at my pad.  She was three seats back, and I didn't want to yell, but how else was I going to be heard.  Rebecca answered that for me by climbing over the seats and flinging her arms over the side to throw her arms over the seat next to me. I bit back a sigh.  I just wanted to surph the net. "So, you find a job yet?"

"No," I said, looking back at my pad.  Rebecca laughed.

"Well, you worked hard at babysitting.  Seemed like you never could meet after book club because you were always busy at work."

"Well, you knew my parents' motto," I said with a forced laugh.  I really wished she would leave me the fuck alone.  It wasn't that I didn't like her, it was just that I didn't want salt to be rubbed in my wounds. "What about you?"

"Just got one," said Rebecca.  I looked at her in surprise. "Course it isn't in Psychology, just sales, so I'll be paying off my college debt for a while until then.  You must have some saved up."

"I declared too much.  I really shouldn't be here.  I've taken to running the stairs just to keep save," I said.  Rebecca looked sympathetic.  We had graduated the same year, but gone to different colleges.  Made sense since our tests had declared us for different fields of study. 

"It has been six months," she said with a sigh. "But you're smart, you're sure to get something. Where have you interviewed?"

"Everywhere," I said, which was true. I had dropped off my resume at every store I could, some I couldn't even reach until my next paycheck as you could only get there.  Only a few places had gotten back.  I might have been babysitting nonstop since I was ten, but that didn't lend me any practical skills in anything that needed a college education.  Well, except teaching, but babysitting hadn't gotten me a college major or minor in teaching. "I swear, college was completely useless.  I can hardly open a spread sheet or make it do even basic sums.  And the employers know it because they won't even hire me as an intern until I have two years of experience in accounting."

"Yeah, I had the same problem.  I got a job at Liars though.  You should apply.  They need some stalkers, and you always were really strong," Rebecca said.  I nodded.  I could drop my resume there again.  Maybe they just had thrown it out when they didn't have the spots yet.  I could just send it again, I had the general format worked out for their ridiculously long sheet and all the answers memorized for the psych evaluation. 

"I think something will work out," I said finally. I reached into my bag and took out the little lion I had made. "I went to the Homemade Stitches today.  I think it well, though they kept giggling."

"You went to..." And then Rebecca started to laugh at me.  I glared at her and she just reached forward and pet my hair absently. "I've missed you.  You are so cute. We should hang out again."

"Yeah," I said with a shrug, though before I was forced to think of a time or place, or Rebecca thought of something, some college graduates I didn't recognize.  I went back to my surfing.  The show was as interesting as I thought.  All about breaking out of the protective box and that something wonderful was on the other side.  Of course it included what horrible the land is outside, and they all find away to build their own little box with their own rules.  It is wonderful and has an ending where if you are watching well enough you wonder if the main character got shot.

I leave the thankfully very crowded cinema.  I let myself be bounced around by the crowd.  If I actually tried, it probably wouldn't be hard to find Rebecca, but I don't call out and I don't hang out near the entrance to try and see if I can find her.  Rebecca has her friends, and even if she looks it won't be hard with others to occupy her time.  Plus, she knows me, she probably knows I'm already gone and is letting me slip from her mind.  If I stayed and she didn't find me or look for me, then I would be depressed for the rest of the night.  My mind a whirlwind of every reason I didn't want her to talk to me, and every reason how I brought this on myself, and on and on.  It wouldn't be at all Rebecca's fault.  I've made this persona.  I prefer this persona and I'll disappear all I want.

So I head up to my apartment via the stairs.  I think the stairs were built to freak people out.  They are huge, with people milling about, taking one huge step at a time.  It's not that only people from the basement use them, though the smell does seem to hint otherwise.  No, it's just that no one looks each other in the eyes and they're desperately trying to see if other people are looking.  Because these people are in a bad spot at the moment or are penny pinchers.  Plus, everyone knows the stairs are monitored.

Everywhere is monitored technically.  I actually freaked out when I realized through scanning that my room was bugged. I'd never tried to get invited to so many places before.  Though running scans had been somewhere between ridiculously easy to ridiculously hard depending on if I had to get everyone around me to ignore me or not. 

Turns out everyone, at least everyone I could secure a invitation from, has bugs in their rooms.  I started to calm down a little at that, but I did have to rethink my room a little.  It might be tiny and claustrophobic, but it had its blind spots.  I hastily not only turned my screen so they couldn't see it and tried to move my apartment around to make the move make sense to anyone who might be watching.

Then I waited for the goons to come in and confiscate my computer and to interrogate me on why my monitor was suddenly in a blind spot, pointed away from the camera.  Then they'd ask about my mysterious employer and the slanderous things I wrote to them.  Not that their really slanderous.  Not more than the government could hear complaints about in every apartment or even in public areas.  And what harm can words do?  It's not like I'm sending out of virus's or codes to my employer.

There's a mother in front of me on the stairs and we're both close to the door.  There's not too much of a bottleneck today, or however that saying goes.  What I mean is that the stairs has one doo to each level and sublevel.   That meant that all of us that use the stairs have one door to go through.  Now most of the time this isn't too much of a problem.  The population is a very small percent according to poles.  A lot of us are the freshly out of college types, especially back in June after we'd graduated, gotten our new apartments, and no longer could get money from our parents. 

Now though, most of them have found some sort of job to tide them over.  To some of them they will never get out of it.  Stuck forever in a low paying, mind numbing, job where they will always be scraping together enough to get by and still will never pay off their college depts.  Others will get lucky, or be tenacious enough to get a job at least in a place and slowly work up to what they were trained for and work out with him how much the company will actually pay of the dept and how much that is going to gauge into what they make the rest of their lives.

I sigh, still watching the mother as she impatiently pulls at her little's boys arm.  He screams.  he probably just started walking by his small stature and waddle.  But these stairs weren't built for little ones.  Sure an adult could take the steps two at time if they were at a bit of a run.  But a child this size has to go at the stairs like the a climbing wall.  The mother isn't even talking to the child, just holding one hand had in her grip as she tugs at his arm so had that people keep glancing down at the child. 

I should have gone past her.  She has babe in her other arm, and its face is scrunched up, clearly ready to let out an ear splitting wail.  And people are pushing past both of us, knocking into me, the woman, and the little boy with serious angry faces that broach no kindness and spread and magnify the misery of everyone forced to try and go home via the stairs. 

So I head back.  The bottleneck might not have started out bad, but with the mother there to complicate things and me not in the mood to push past her like the rest, well, I might as well wait until the crowd thins and the woman and children are gone.  So I head to the side and down a couple of steps and lean against the railing and look up to the next twist of stairs. 

I try to pull from memory the schematics that I had pulled on where the cameras were.  I had found once some schematics someone else had posted of our staircase, but they had seemed weird to me so I had hobbled something together and spent months of my freshmen year of school writing a virus that let me get into the government database.  Also was when I really started to explore the hacking world.  I was more of a scavenger or pickpocket than an actual member.  I never really interacted, just took ideas and codes, and the few times I contributed, like when I actually posted what the schematics were they "couldn't e taken seriously because I couldn't give any back up to what I showed.

It really didn't bother me at.  But I quickly learned we weren't the only home, or that every secluded area was called a home. 

"Are you alright?" I almost jumped out of my skin when someone touched my shoulder.  The woman quickly backed up, brown eyes going wide. "Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you."

Like an idiot, I continued to just stare at her until she must have thought I was idiot.  It was just that she had a black swirl around one eye.  It wasn't a fashion statement, it meant she a construction worker, the way her skin is worn by the elements and a scar on her lips makes me think that she's one who goes out of the house to fix up from the outside. 

"I'm fine," I said, pushing myself up hurriedly. "Thanks..."

And then I was going toward the bottleneck.  The mother and her kids were gone, and the construction workers didn't bump me around too much as I made my way out.  It then takes a while to navigate to the poorest end of the apartments and to my one room closet.  A simple thumbprint gets me in, and as always since I moved my mattress to the corner, I almost trip on my covers.  The place is small with only one other "room" which is the toilet, and you can't really sit on the toilet and close the door.

The message box is blinking. I hit the button as I take off my hat and let my hair spill down my back.

"Hi again honey, I know you wanted to wait until the end of the week to call us, but your brother isn't coming this weekend so I have no one to talk to.  I wanted to check on how the job searching was going," my mother's face appears on the small screen. She's mixing something together in a bowl as she talks and is all habitual smiles. I take off my fingerless gloves so I can redo my hair.  It's been pulling at my head for the last hour in my hat, and I really should put it in a fast bun before I put my freezing temperatures hat on.  "Anyway, I didn't want to tell you because I didn't want to get your hopes up, but unfortunately Margareta won't be hiring you.  Instead she hired some boy from level 2.5 apparently showing that those there really do have what it takes to have a job as long as you give them a chance.  Like my girl doesn't have potential as long as she gave you a chance.  Oh, sounds like the chickens done.  Call me when you get home."

I grab the speaker from the latch after pulling the freezing hat on.  It's one of my own make, with little piglets based on the ones I'd seen on the ground level one field trip.  Once done with a few chores and changing and generally settling into my apartment.  Finally I take the speaker into bed, wiggling under the covers and thanking everything I knew that bedding was one of the things I took from my parents' house, I then reached up and brought down the little contraption over my head.  The metal squeaked a little, but soon the little table with my laptop was down.

My hands immediately started to get to work.  I didn't even need to think about what I was doing really, my mind already going through what needed to get done.  Even as I hooked up the speaker to my computer I realized that I couldn't call my mother yet.  Actually it was a bit of a relief.  Not the not calling my mom bit, the what needed to get done that day. 

With a quick movement I turned my four split screen into two.  One was fambox where I brought up some of my old videos.  Most of these were about getting together, getting your hair done, making sure you wore the right stuff, basically it was for children much younger than I was, but I still found myself drawn to it.  It was a love-hate thing where I watched it and couldn't help but note it was stupid beyond belief, and yet when the next episode came out, I was always ready to watch it.

The second split screen there was what I was working on for employer.  It wouldn't take me long to cobble it together.  It wasn't like most weeks where I waited until the last moment to write it out.  Really, I had no idea what they saw in it.  I wasn't even coherent in my rants for the most part.  I never even edited what I wrote.  I didn't see the point.  I mean, who actually read my stream of consciousness anyway?

This week it turned out that I wanted to work hard on my piece, well sort of.  Actually the rant made even less sense than usual.  I had just let my fingers fly over the board on Sunday.  Then on Monday, after not getting any calls or anyone interested in even giving me a chance at a job, I had gone back and looked what I had written.  I then started to play around with it.  With color, with size, with font.  Now it looked like one of those horrible poems you had to look at and then experiment with in school. 

But since it was mine, I liked it, which means that my teachers would have hated it because it was derivative.  But hey, I got paid a little tiny bit of money to write it.  So write it I did, and with a couple of changes I can't help but wonder if this would get me fired even if it was the piece I had put the most work into and done the most editing to.  But finally I unhooked my wires, careful with the one for my tablet which really needed to get changed soon before it broke completely. 

Well, I'd get some money tomorrow, but I really was running out of money.  I only had enough babysitting money for two more months and basically buying everything else I needed like food, transportation, and supplies to get my new job.  And that was stretching the little amount of money I made each week that way.  I then sent what I had.  Once the piece was sent, I pushed down my fear.  When I had written on Sunday, I had purposely not written anything inflammatory, mostly because I hadn't been in the mood that day, and since then, well, if anyone could even identify what I had been talking about and what all these weird things I'd done symbolized when it was only meaningful to me, then I had a lot more fans than I thought who were apparently also physic. 

In then activated a program that latched onto what I had sent and where I had sent it and destroyed everything that I could that would let anyone find or follow back to me.  After that I reconnected everything and called back my mother. 

Within three rings I not only had turned off the video, but brought up some other things.  Mostly I checked over everything that needed to be kept track of.  Not that anyone would get any money from me by going through my bank account, but I also checked my credit score, and the few credit cards I had.  Really, I only had one because my mother was afraid I wouldn't be responsible enough with my money.  I hardly used the thing.  I usually only had my apartment payment on it, and as soon as it showed up, I paid it off. 

Nothing was on it at the moment, but I looked deeper.

"Hello honey!" came the excited voice of my mother while her wide smile light up the screen on the right side of my computer. "You're calling a bit late.  Did you get a job?"

"No, just an interview," I said.

"Oh honey, I'm sorry," said my mom obviously reading my expression.  Which is fine with me.  I'd rather not explain why even though they hadn't told me I hadn't gotten the job I wouldn't get the job.  Not that I wanted it now that I knew what it was. "Why don't you go out tonight?  I'm heard there's a nice place near where you live, and I'm sure if you call a few friends they would be happy to join you."

"Don't have the money," I said, flicking my eyes down to where I was writing a bit of code.  Why couldn't the English language be as easy to play with and work with as binary?  Why couldn't math be like binary.  I liked it.  During high school when I had just started my extra classes on computers when it turned out well, yeah, that, I had loved figuring out code.  I don't know what brought it up, maybe an extra credit activity or the teacher had gone off script, but I had loved it.  It was like a puzzle.  All the pieces were there, and the teacher had told me what it meant, but now I had to go back in and figure out why.

I hadn't been the fastest or the most comprehensible at explaining my findings to my teacher the next day, but he had actually been surprised when I admitted that was going to be an accountant, or at least, that's what my test showed my perfect job would be.  He had simply stared at me before admitting that he had been sure that I was going to be a programmer.

"Oh darling, I just don't like to see you so sad," my mother said, and I realized that my thoughts must have shown on my face again.

"Tell her she should get a guy to pay for her then," called my dad from somewhere in the background.  I rolled my eyes even as his unshaven for at least a day face appeared on the screen. "You should get..."

"I heard you the first time and no," I said. "I'm not charming enough."

It was my dad's turn to roll his eyes.  He wanted me to meet some nice boy who I would support me until I found a good paying job that paid my bills and loosened my anxiety over my debt and budget.  He also wanted grandchildren he could spoil rotten and was starting to get rather impatient with me and my brother's. 

"Well, your mom is starting the paperwork to get you back here with us," said my father, and left the screen quickly.  My mother yelled my father's name and then glared at his retreating figure, apparently not impressed that he had dropped that bombshell and then left her alone to try and sooth me.

"Mom, I still have two months worth of money before they allow that," I said through gritted teeth.  It would do no good to tell my mother not to worry about the paperwork, I would get to it when the time was right, unless I showed it to her and she looked over it for mistakes, then she would do the paperwork for me.  Also if I yelled at her than we would both feel like I had acted wrongfully and my mother would gain complete control over the situation.

"Oh, they'll make an exception, I know.  After all, it's not like you don't have parents who can't support you or family who can't until you get your feet under you like other families.  They will see how it makes more sense to let you come home so we can start giving back some of their money and you can find a job that will get them back the money and be a productive member of society quickly," my mom said cheerfully with an extra kick in her voice as she seemed to be talking twenty miles an hour.  I rolled my eyes.  I really didn't mind my apartment.  I liked working on my bed and I was never one for making or eating any sort of fancy food, the bars tasted fine.

"I hate moving" I said in irritation.  Curling into my bed, swearing that I saw a puff of dragon breath as I breathed. I read a little on some nonsensical political thing.  My friends always teased about how the government was always watching and tracking what you were reading.  It used o make me extraordinarily paranoid.  I used to delete my browsing history and then pray to whoever was outside the this was enough to keep anyone from hauling me away and yelling and making everyone and my family disappointed.  But now I realized that reading anything that we did get to read on the internet wasn't going to get you pinged anymore than being a law abiding citizen was going to mean people actually would monitor the bugs implanted in your home.  After all, that would mean a lot of people constantly not only scanning all the cameras all over The Home, but also in every home.  Even with everything on fast forward in low risk zones where it could be reviewed later, well, that would take a long time or a lot of wasted employees.

Too much money.  Too much of a security risk.  After all, I'd met a few guys who tried to get into just the defenders branch from back home who hoped to move up in status as they advanced through their jobs, I knew what they looked for and all the things they rejected you for. Any physical abnormality or problem.  Any mental problems from intelligence to stability.  You had a weakness, they didn't want you for even the most basic job it seemed like.  And one of the people rejected had been the son of a General from what I understood and had seemed sane to me. 

"Honey, we still have your room.  You know how you wanted to be a quick writer in middle school?  Well, we've kept your room as close you needed to," she said, a huge smile on my face.  I rolled my eyes. 

"That was back in middle school," I pointed out.  After all, while it had been a nice dream to just write a bit and it to be socially acceptable to spend the rest of my life living off my family, it quickly became clear to me later that it never would work out.  Besides the fact that I would never make the right connections to get that sort of privilege, I learned that I really didn't want to be a burden on anyone no matter the circumstances. "I don't understand why I didn't get to be a programmer."

"Your father actually might have the solution to that.  You might not get the job you want since getting the education might be impossible if you don't get at least some of the of your debt paid off," my mom said. I actually paid attention when she said this.  It gave me hope that something great would happen, though it probably wouldn't.

"Alight, fine," I said and took a deep breath in. "Maybe if I don't get something by the end of next week then we'll file it."

I really didn't want to admit it, but I needed to get it done.  If I could get a job by scrounging off my parents, then I would.  I mean, privilege of getting into the right family is something any sane person would do.  I just hated having to do it.

My mother of course just jumped up and down and gave me a full mess of all the ingredients she got to put in her recipes.

"Well, I'll be sure to make your favorites when you meet us," she said. "Oh that would be your brother, back from his school.  You want to say hello?"

"No," I said, but I smiled and didn't turn off my connection. 

"I'm home if you haven't noticed," my brother said, dropping his bag, probably filled with dirty clothes. He saw me in the connection and went to stand next to my mother. "Hi sister."

"Hello Grouch," I said back with a wave.

"Are you sleeping right now?" he asked, probably seeing as I was reclined and had on the thick pjs I'd gotten when there had been rumors that the heating had gone funny and that everyone even in the better streets better be ready for weird temperatures.  We got everything to frost being reported in a thick layers in certain homes and even on the ground floor where food was made, to sweltering heat that made it possible to cook eggs on your countertops and even things just catching fire. 

In the end, more people had been declared dead than since the Homes had been built so long ago. 

"No," I said with a sigh. "I'm just in bed."

"So you coming home or what?" he asked.  My mom pushed him away, trying to get him out of the way.  She pulled so hard that the shirt he was wearing so that the sleeve clip came loose and hung limply at his side as he jumped from side to side. 

I gave him the finger. 

"Jennifer!" shouted my mother, looking completely scandalized.  I rolled my eyes.  Even after I had moved out. "Really, go unpack now.  You'll see your sister soon enough."

"So that's a yes on the moving back bit?" he asked with a laugh while my mom continued to try and push him away to go to his own room to hang out in.

The conversation didn't keep going after my brother came in.  My mom now felt secure that she would see her little girl now and didn't need to keep me on the phone until we need my signature on the papers in order to get them out. 

I decided that my day had been long enough and needed to get some sleep.


	2. New Job

Three days passed and the only difference was that I dropped off three more resumes and had a bit of money to at least use the lifts.  I didn't get any more money for my stream of consciousness gibberish, but I did get my usual amount for the piece and no one left a message that made me think I was fired, so I figured editing and giving a piece that weird touch to it hadn't hurt me, but that in the end if I didn't edit then I wouldn't be hurt either.  Well, with the money I had gotten I had been able to buy enough of the cheapest bars to last two weeks, though it meant that I only had four more times I could take the lift this week. 

So I took the stairs again. 

While job searching, I had almost signed up to be on construction.  I was a year from the cutoff point.  I would start small, and as long as I got lucky and got beginner jobs then I would be able to get a comfortable apartment, a gym membership, and the ability to go see my parents at least once a month.  The thing was, while I had the strength for it, I didn't think I had the strength of mind for it.  Half the people that lived in the basement and refused any help on the second and a half floor were failed construction workers.  People who had tried but failed to make it. 

So yeah, as long as you passed the physical and mental test then you usually got in.  That's why you applied instead of sending in a resume.  The physical was apparently effective.  The only reason you got kicked out was if you lost a limb, or sensation in some of your limbs.  So the physical usually was a problem, instead what got most was the stress of working outside the home.  If you were lucky, you spent your time inside fixing the elevator and everything that went wrong on the ground floor.  Really, the chances you'd be assigned inside instead of out were much better, but still, no one really wanted to chance that.  Not after hearing the horror stories and seeing all that had gone wrong with the construction workers forced to work outside the home. 

I shuffled around, and stuffed my stuff into a bag and then air locked so it wouldn't take up too much space, and I found my towel along with the simple bit of soap I had left.  The free baths were actually getting "fresh" water today and I still had a mark for the week.  Usually I would opt to get washed without the disgusting water that left me feeling more dirty before I came in.  But now, all I wanted to do was soak. 

My street was busy that day, everyone chatting and excited for a dip.  When I lived on my parents' street, we had water most of time during what was called the "wet season".  Now though, it's whenever there's enough water for this poor district and it's usually so used that not even the purifiers can get all the grime out.

But I just wanted to float.  There's something relaxing about just letting your body be held up by water.  The way your neck would start to cramp up if you stayed still too long.  Thankfully it wouldn't be hard to stay afloat.  I quickly headed down the corridor, and quickly realized that most of the people who lived on corridor must have heard and had the same idea as me and either worked weird hours or were in the same situation as I was.

I danced from foot to foot, trying to fight the need to run back to my cramped apartment or sit down and curl into a ball.  It would help calm me, but it would also lose me my place.  When I got into the bath I watched in irritation as a bracelet was attached to my wrist.  It would blink down in a sequence of colors when it started to get to my turn to leave.  If I didn't leave, then the enforcer's brought here for the day would drag e out.  While financially this might not work for the government, fining people in our corridor, or really anyone who used the free baths.  After all, I could still feel the thick slime and grit under my feet from the one time I hadn't brought the sandals my parents had got me when I had to move to this district. 

Now I never forgot them, though they wouldn't be much use this time. 

It smelled horribly, and I curled into a ball and forced my head down beneath the putrid water.  Part of me couldn't help but imagine what was happening as the dirt settled into my hair and under my pores.  It was disgusting.  Still, the weightlessness I felt just floating was nice, until I bumped into someone.  I sat up, saying a quick apology to the person who just glared at me.  Even with only a limited amount of people allowed to be in the baths, it was still overcrowded.

I wanted to tell the idiot was that he could put as much cheap shampoo in his hair as he wanted, but with the water as disgusting as it was, he was only going to be more dirty by the end.  Of course, with that little encounter, I was reminded how naked I was, and well, I don't know.  It's not that I worried anything would happen, I just got a bunch of bubbles in my stomach and I wanted to wash up and get out as soon as I could.  The first light shown on my bracelet.  I went over and stood under a quick shower before something went wrong.  I always wondered how what appeared to be an air current got all the dirt off me. 

By the time the second light was showing up, I was quickly pull on my clothes again.  Within seconds I had found my pad.  The machine beeped as I turned it on and then quickly went through to see if anyone had tried to hack it manually.  Nothing turned up, but I kept writing.  However, it turned out that someone did want an interview.  This was for just an hour from now for a job on the ground floor working at one of the textiles.  I even got a temporary pass to that floor, which was nice because I definitely did not have enough money to buy one. 

I dropped off the bracelet as I left, dodging around people as I headed out of the bathhouse.  Once I got to my apartment I quickly found an outfit I thought would be appropriate for the interview.  I was never one hundred percent sure it was right, but within seconds I had all I needed.  Of course, I did quickly braid my hair and pin it a little so it would stay under my cap.  I almost wished that I had some makeup to put on.  But it was too expensive, and I would be guessing what I needed. 

The elevator thankfully took my scan from my pad.  After all, I might have sent some resumes that way, but I hadn't included a cover letter or anything, I really hadn't expected to hear a thing after all.  You usually didn't get a call from the ground floor to work there.  The people who worked there usually lived there, and the people who got jobs there were from there. 

Unfortunately they didn't have a job for me.  When they put me through some sort of test they said they found I was too spacey for the floor and watching the machines, but they did say that they would recommend me to some of the farms, though the lamented there weren't more of them since most posts were interested.  They said that with my work ethic and ability to lift things and keep going would be ideal for that or construction work.  Basically they were very nice but they didn't need me. 

I walked out, wondering if perhaps I should sign up for construction sooner than later.  The bars I ate, while sustaining, I only ate half of, and keeping up a regiment that kept what muscles I had was difficult with only the weights I was able to fit in my apartment, and I also needed food to be able to do it.  While construction would be hard and never really pay anything, at least I would have something to do.  Better than relying on my parents to get me a job that I would never really be any good at.  I didn't want to be that girl after all. 

As I stepped onto the elevator, I decided to give myself a day to think things over.  My mother would have hardly been able to force the files through fast, so I wouldn't be moving in with her for at least a week I wouldn't think.  She would have gotten the files in as fast as she could though, which made me look down at my pad.  If I went home, I could hack into the government files and find out how far they had been pushed and what the verdict was. 

Though I wasn't sure if I wanted to.  I tried to not hack directly into the government secured files when I could.  It always made sleeping for the next couple of days almost impossible, and I still had nightmares of what would happen if they did. 

The elevator gave a weird lurch, bumping a bit as it headed up.  I was the only one on it at the time.  But as this was one meant to take you anywhere you wanted, including the ground floor, and it was fairly late at night, that wasn't too surprising.  My eyes lazily scanned to the board wondering what I would do once I got home when I realized that the light on the board indicated I was on level 2.5 and I still felt as if I was going upward.

My hands gripped hard around my pad, shoving the thing into my pocket before I ran into the government officials that were probably waiting to pick me up and ask why I had used my pass to go to the government level.  I groaned.  I hadn't realized that it would let me.  I had thought that once it read the scanner to get into the elevator, it would only let me go to the floor that I had the interview on.  Plus, I hadn't pushed the button on purpose, I just hadn't been paying attention when I got in and I was used to hitting the button close to the end of the list. 

Really, did they just allow the people on the ground level to get to the government and army level so easily.  After all, the rumors were that the people on the ground level while essential were also the least intelligent because of education offered and general inbreeding. 

The door clicked open.  I had opted to stand in the middle of the elevator with hands slightly held away from my body and open.  No one was there to greet or harass me.  I let out a sigh of relief.  Apparently they were not paying enough attention or they had realized I had made a mistake and were letting me go back to the right floor.  Either way, I would be on my best behavior for a couple of months and definitely not hacking my way into any government files any time soon. 

I reached forward and hit the button to take me back to the second floors and the long walk back to my apartment.  That is when the warning bell rang.  The sheer volume had me practically jumping out of my skin.  I ran out of the elevator in sheer panic as red lights lit around the elevator and the doors almost crashed on my heels as the tightly sealed themselves. 

After that, I panicked.  I walked quickly from the elevator and into the main building area.  I then found myself luckily in a crowd of people, all talking together.  Of course, I didn't really fit with any of them, some of them even looking like prostitutes.  Which perhaps was just because they were standing next to people in tight black suites and dulled army uniforms, but I didn't they were wearing quite a bit of makeup and clothes that while might be considered modest, were designed in such a way as it seemed meant to draw the eye and make you want to peel it away.  Modest in an indecent way.  I snorted.  Perhaps other people did have the same problems as me.  After all, prostitutes were supposed to have clearance to all sorts of levels, especially the lowest ones where they met their clients, perhaps they hit the wrong button and were then dealt with here.

Not wanting to be yelled at though, I opted to find a nice corner where I plugged in and got to work.   It was stupid of the government to funnel both the legitimate government workers and army men at the same time place as the rest of us lost idiots.  With my pad I kept plugged in I had an easy time getting in and getting myself a guest pad.  They even had one that allowed for complete anominity.

By doing it myself I was able to see exactly what I was allowed to do and what they expected.  Within moments I was able to create a nice way to keep going.  I then followed it exactly as I could.  Blending in was more of the problem.  I really didn't look like a prostitute, at least not from the few I was pretty sure were ones from the open.  For one thing, while I had spent a few months with limited food, I was still rather big for an average girl.  I might be soft spoken and into stitching, knitting, and crocheting, but I was six feet tall and had always loved keeping in shape. 

I made my way around the compound, keeping my eyes down on my pad and trying to look as if I knew what I was doing.  No one stopped me, most people looked too busy to pay me any attention, or too into whatever they were doing to stop a girl who looked civilian.  Then again, they did seem to be in more "relaxed" clothing themselves if they were less busy. 

I then took a sharp left and into a corner where an elevator was situated.  This one was for prostitutes.  Embarrassing really, but it was meant to get rid of prostitutes as quickly as possible and avoid gossip and embarrassment.  Well, for the person who hired them at least.  I jumped a little and tried to look relaxed as the door dinged and someone actually left.  She was thin as a rail, with bright red hair, and dressed all in silk with only her face and hands showing as she seemed completely absorbed in her work. 

I then used my pass to get onto the elevator.  Actually, I was really happy that it shredded it as I put it through.  I was also glad that I had gloves on almost twenty-four seven so they wouldn't get a fingerprints on anything.  I also tried to angle of my hat and face so that I wouldn't show up on the camera.  I mean, yeah, six feet tall girls was not that known, but I was sure there was more than just me. 

Once I was home I fell onto my bed, then I did something I swore I wouldn't.  Which was that I then hacked my way into the system.  But I had a very good reason for doing so.  I realized that just being good wasn't going to work well enough.  For one thing, yep, there it was.  The information of what I had done with the pass given to my card.  I quickly went about destroying that information.  I had to be careful so I wouldn't cause any bells to ring if they did check up on it.  After all, my being there had set off at least one alarm, I had to hope I hadn't been the only one. 

Then I went about destroying the information that I had gone to the third floor, making it look as if I had gone off at the second one instead. 

I let out a sigh of relief once I was done. 

Still, I hardly got any sleep at all that night. 

"Hey honey, you there?" I forced my eyes open as apparently my mom was on the line.  I hit the button as fast as I could and then took out the mic.  I then opened my computer and my mom's face appeared. "Oh, wonderful.  I had hoped you hadn't left yet.  Though, for someone so busy looking for jobs, it looks like you just woke up."

"Stayed up late for an interview yesterday.  Don't worry, didn't work out.  And I've already dropped off all my stuff already," I said with a sigh.

"You can do it again," she said with a slight reprimand in her voice.

"I was thinking of signing up to be a construction worker," I said.  Not that I was being smart about this at all.  After all, while I was trying to get a rise out of her, getting a rise out of her was more irritating than anything else. 

"What, no, you know what your dad thinks about tattoos," she said.  I lifted an eyebrow, really, that's the first thing she brought up. "You have better prospects than that.  I got all the information in last night, and I think you will soon be working in our district.  You're a smart girl."

"Mom," I said with a sigh.

"Listen, I've been talking with Brittany, she thinks that she can fit you into janitorial job at first and have you intern on off hours with one of her computer geeks.  You always did like working on the computer," she said with a smile.  I felt my eyes widen.  That would actually be perfect.  If there was one thing that I always had been good with was computers and code.  Actually by working with computers, my mom had always assumed I would be good with numbers.  Forget what my teachers said about me having no intuition when it came to them, no, of course I was exaggerating when I said that my test had to be a fluke because there was no way I was good at accounting.

"Are you sure?" I asked.  My mom nodded.

"I mean, she hasn't signed off on it yet, obviously or you would be back here, but that's just because we're working out the kinks.  And since you can't work there and also afford the price of apartments you'll be expected to come work with us again!" she said, I watched in amusement as my mom actually bounced around the room.  I have no idea how many times I've told her that I preferred having my own place, that I didn't want to move back even if it meant living the rest of my life in this shoebox, but since she was the one who was going to get me a job I could actually stand, well, then it was probably just my duty to suck it up and let her put me back to living with her and dad again.

"So when do you think..." I trailed off, not really wanting to say it.

"Oh, soon, they said they'd get back in a week, and I'm seeing Brittany today, so there's a chance you'll be moving back in a couple of days," I smiled and nodded.  She chatted away about something she watched and heard the other day while I half listened, though I was at least good enough not to downsize her screen and work or look at something else while she chatted away.  Finally she said goodbye as the tone came from my pad that I had a new notice.  She made me promise I would not take any jobs and to stall as she worked things out and I nodded and turned off the screen watching as she disappeared. 

It was a surprise when it turned out that Homemade Stitches was the one sending me a follow through on our interview and wanted to do another one that afternoon.  After the dreadful first one where the girl talking to me seemed to be trying to bite back laughter after every answer I gave her, and then even Rebecca laughing at the fact I had tried to get a job there, I had decided to completely write off the place. 

Still, I didn't want to seem rude.  I didn't however decide to dress up, for one thing, I'd worn the outfit too many times and I wasn't trying to impress.  This time I took the stairs.  I didn't want to chance that I would run out of money if my mom couldn't make it all work.  I was optimistic, not stupid.    

The stairs were filled with people, but no one with the tattoos of a construction worker.  There were a couple of people with ragged clothing holding out basic pads with the app for receiving money on them with the scars of someone who used to be a construction worker.  My dad had already been angry whenever he saw those on the janitors at the plant he worked at.  He said that it was easy to remove tattoos without leaving permanent scaring, and that shaming people who were hurting from emotional scaring.

Homemade Stitches was almost empty when I headed inside.  One person was idly looking at some plush animals with a sad frown on his face, while the teller read a book and popped gum from where she was lounging at the desk. 

When I entered the bell rang out like an echo through the store and the girl looked up before glancing down at the desk.  A smile spread slowly across her face and she stood up and headed toward me. 

"You must be Jennifer," she said, extending her hand toward me. "Welcome to the family."

"I haven't got the job yet," I pointed out with a shaky smile.  The girl only rolled her eyes.

"Don't be ridiculous.  Stephanie always knows her talent," the girl said with a smirk.  I just sighed and nodded my head. "Scram Mr. Cramer."

This was said nastily, but the man just nodded, put down the plushy and left the store without a complaint. 

"Useless man.  Gets a crap reputation and won't even buy any of the crafts," said the clerk with a snort of disgust as she actually locked up the store.  I had to raise an eyebrow at her.  It was weird that she would close down the store just for an interview. "Come on.  Stephanie is waiting."

We went into the backroom, the entire place was rather bare bones, with stairs going down instead of up and the doors completely nondescript.  This time, instead of going down one level, we went down six.  I wondered if we were heading further and further down.

The door opened to a bright room that actually made me squint after going down the dark staircase.  It was bright colors that flared and mixed together in a way that actually hurt my eyes.  In the middle of the room was a metal desk and computers lined everywhere.  Three of them sitting on the desk.

"Ah, thank you Melanie," said a soft voice. "You didn't need to close up though."

"You are absolutely no fun at all," said the clerk, but she closed the door and left.  Presumably to open the door.  I would get it all together before long.

"Hello dear," said Stephanie, turning around on her seat.  I jumped and actually involuntarily found myself backing up into the door. 

"Hi," I said, trying to sound nonchalant. After all, I had been fine yesterday.  Nothing was going to turn out badly.  This was just a coincidence.

"Well, that was just what I needed.  You know, it was hard finding you after you destroyed almost all hints of your work," she said.  I blushed and looked at the floor.

"I have no idea what you mean," I said, my voice not able to go above a loud whisper. 

"You ended up on the third floor yesterday.  Weird place for a girl with paranoid tendency and no job yet.  But I was able to find out that a girl got a pass for an interview, and then it was easy to find your picture," she said with a smile. My hands were scrabbling for the door handle, just as my mind was telling me that if I did open the door than the official on the other side would get me and then interrogate me on how I had gotten rid of those files. "Oh calm down dear, I have no plans to turn you as long as you agree to my terms."

"Terms?" I squeaked, not liking the sound of that at all, or the creepy smile that she was giving me. 

"Don't look so worried," she said folding her hands and placing her chin on them. "It will solve both our problems."

I looked at her in worry, but nodded for her to continue.                                 

"I want to offer you a job here.  A time ago I lost my hackers, and have been trouble finding someone to  replace them.  I even have an agreement here for you to sign," she said, pushing a pad toward me.  I slowly walked toward her, and she made a small movement for me to come over to me. I looked it over and then glared at her.

"This says I'm going to be a prostitute," I snapped, and then cringed. "Have you seen me?"

"I've hired worse," she said, looking me over. "And you don't have a choice."

"Then what was that shit about hiring me as a hacker?" I asked angrily, though my hands and body trembled at my side. Probably not the smartest thing to say when everything was going so wrong. But at least I wasn't on the ground crying or hyperventilating. 

"Not very subtle are you?" asked the woman. "Read between the lines."

"So I'm not going to be a prostitute?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

"No, you are going to be trained to be that too," said Stephanie with a hard smile.

"Sorry, I have a job lined up," I said, turning to leave.

"The door won't open until I let it," said Stephanie with a sigh. "And then I tell the government about your little hacking project, and then they give you to me after you spend some time in their jail.  After all, they know I don't get my girls and boys just for their looks."

I paled a little.  Not sure what to do with that information.  Then I walked back to the desk and started reading again.  I didn't read anything that would make me think that she was hiring me as a hacker.  I reached forward to touch the screen and the pad was ripped from my hands.  She had a wide smile before her face fell and she glared at me.  I lifted my hands in surrender  showing off my gloves.  She just glared.

I looked at her, and decided that, well, I seemed trapped.  There was no one I could go to, even if I brought it to the attention of the government and Stephanie had been lying about working with them, well, they would know I had been hacking.

Looking her straight in her eyes, I took off by gloves.  Alright, so I had absolutely no interest in being intimate with anyone.  But I knew how to self-service, and I had nothing against prostitutes except that it was against the law and I would never want to be caught doing it.  But well, everyone knew that it was a job that was overlooked by all officials except the insane.  So it shouldn't be too bad.  With my hand bare, I let my fingerprint sink in and sign the contract.  It shouldn't be that hard to get out of, I just had to work it right. 


	3. Ridiculous

Stephanie told me to go up one floor.  The door was unlocked.  I headed up the stairs and froze when I opened the right door.  Lined on all the walls was rows of desks with huge mirrors and, and on the desks were makeup and accessories, most gaudy.  The people inside were at various level of undress.  One dark girl with chocolate skin that shimmered with sweat and glimmer, black hair that fell straight to the middle of her back, and no clothes was putting a silk blanket on top of some pillows. 

Everyone close looked toward me close to the door.  Most were women, but a couple of men in glitter and tight clothes were also walking around.  They saw me and gave a slight smile. "Your here!"

The girl with no clothes bounced toward me.  I backed into the closed door as the girl came toward me.  Well, I call her a girl, but she was in her mid-twenties at least.  She came at me with no restraint, pulling me into a tight kiss that started at my cheek because as normal I turned my face away on instinct.  She was slick, at first her skin was cold with the slick of whatever the sticky stuff she had put on was.  Not sweat but thick.  Her fingers were thin, though when I moved my hands to take her, the one without the glove, I felt calluses on them.

Her mouth was slick, with no breaks in her lips while mine were very chapped.  Her muscles were toned.  Sure, you couldn't see it if you weren't looking, but her body wasn't soft either.  Each piece of clothing that came off was weird, and soon I felt my body shivering slight from the cold.  I did however glare when they took off my hat and started to card through my hair.  I hadn't liked it when they did that.

Within moments I was against the cool silk, frozen as it went against my back.  A hand groped over my breast, feeling it up, but it did mean that she stopped kissing for a moment.  I let my head fall back and looked backward where we seemed to have got the interest of only a few other prostitutes.  Some were smirking, a couple met my eyes and looked at me in confusion. 

She brought my head back up for a kiss and I smelled the stuff on her skin.  It wasn't flowers or anything, no, it actually smelled more like olive oil than anything else.  Her hair tickled my arm as her legs pushed between my legs, spreading me, which felt weird with nothing to cover it, especially when that leg disappeared.  Then big hands then grabbed at my knees, spreading my legs as the first dark girl moved higher on my body as she nuzzled at the point between my neck and shoulder.  Then I caught a look at who was dragging me toward them. 

Everything went dark with panic.  I must have somehow thrown the girl off me, because two sets of hands  were holding me tight and I was looking down at a blonde boy, completely naked was lying on the ground with blood on his face, a high heel between the two of us.

Then the girl was back on me.  The two holding me, made to protest, but the girl put up a quick finger and they stopped.  I let her push me back and felt her hand go down to touch my clit, though she stopped when she felt me tense when she tried to go inside me.  We shared eye contact for a moment and heard some laughter and people saying that I was definitely not hired as a prostitute.  Which was a little comforting, though the looks they were giving me were not as clear. 

I shuddered and then turned the girl over and tried to return the favor.  She looked amused through all of it, her breath going faster and faster, until finally she convulsed under my hands. 

"Clumsy, but I can work with that," she said, her small breasts rippling with her breath.  I scooted off her and glared at the people who had my clothes.  I held out a hand toward them and they started laughing. The girl I was on top of me then rolled over and laughed. "You'll get your clothes back after we get you some for our job."

I glared at her and she touched foreheads with me.  I'll be your trainer.  Paul was going to be too.  But seeing as you beat him senseless, we'll stick with me for the time being," she said, giving me a little nuzzle.  I pushed her away, figuring the assault was done for now and giving her a glare.  "Who are you? And what you're a..."

"Not your specialty," said the girl with a wink. "Though I've got one of my own.  And the name's Amy."

"Right, is the sexual assault done now?" I asked and jumped a little as cool cloth with bright designs of neon colors was draped over her shoulders. 

"So over dramatic," said Amy with a roll of her eyes. "Come on, we'll get you to your desk.  Get you dolled up and setup."

She led me behind the first row of desks and mirrors to another row.  I looked at it, mostly uninterested as the people there were primping or gossiping, with only one person doing something odd.

"This the new girl?" asked someone as Amy sat me down in the desk next to me.  She appeared to be sharpening a knife, the humming buzz of electricity coming from it once she stopped playing with it.

"Yes, her name is Jennifer," said Amy, giving my shoulder a little bit of a hug. "You alright?  You're shaking."

I gave her a quick glare over my shoulder before turning to look at the mirror.  I blinked in surprise when I found the newest pad lying there amid the makeup and accessories.

"Why do you care if she's shaking?" asked the girl, her voice was nasally, the sort that scratched hard at your ears if your listened to it for too long. 

"She beat Paul senseless with a heel when he tried to introduce himself," said Amy with a sigh.  I glared at her and then turned on my pad to start exploring and seeing if all the things I'd read about it was true.

"Of course she did.  She's hired for a purpose right?" asked the girl. "That means she's probably not on the pill and you should have brought her here first before getting a bearing on how much work she needs."

I looked over at her with a glare.

"So, what's her kink going to be?" she asked. "Amazon woman?  I can totally be the one to take her to the gym."

I looked at her more critically now, and realized that she had pretty toned muscles, more so than Amy.  She smiled at me, letting her legs twine together.

"She's not a guard," said Amy with a roll of her eyes as I said...

"You have a gym?"

Amy looked at me while the other girl just smirked. "I'm Lisa." she said to me before looking over at Amy. "And just because she's apparently a geek does not mean she doesn't work out."

"Whatever," said Amy. "She's not an Amazon woman, she's snow white."

"You're kidding right?" asked Lisa.  Amy just smiled in a way that made both of us sigh.  I looked back at the mirror and realized that Amy was right.  I was shaking.

"I hadn't done that before," I said softly, before trying to go back to pad.  Amy caught my hand.  I looked up at her and she brought me closer and then shakily smiled.

"This is probably too much for the first day," said Amy finally then glanced between Lisa and me. "How about we get your clothes and you go to the gym with Lisa.  We can get you fitted tomorrow."

"What about the pad?" I asked.

"Pick it up when you leave for today," said Lisa. "We're going to have some fun."

I had a weird amount of people watching me as I put my clothes back on.  Unlike what I had seen from the government building, what I saw here were a lot of prostitutes in just a little more clothing than Amy.  One of the girls who had played with my hair when Amy assaulted me helped put my hair in a quick bun before I put my hat back on.

"Cool look," said Lisa. "Come on, I'll show you the way."

We went up one floor and came into a room that was less crowded with mostly men.  I had to wonder how many people had heard about what I had done to Paul because they all looked very worried I was there.  It was fine though because I just worked with Lisa, getting lost in the sensation of lifting and spotting.  I really had missed working out.  It always just let me relax, give my muscles some needed work while letting my mind just get caught up in the repetition of it. 

When we finally left, I felt like I at least had someone who listened to me.  I was allowed to pick up my pad, though some guy came right into my space.  Apparently I knocked him hard in the nose, which Lisa found hysterical, until she saw my expression.  She then sent me home with my first paycheck, since apparently Stephanie thought it would be safer if I worked for her a week so that the government wouldn't be suspicious. 

I wasn't complaining. 

Still, I used the stairs to go up to my room, mostly giving myself time to think.  I took step by step, trying to ignore everyone around me.  As it was just after noon then there were not too many people on the stairs.  Still, I was careful not to touch anyone.  I finally got off the stairs and felt my entire body shaking with tears starting to build at the corner of my eyes and my breath coming faster I thought I should get to the end.  The faster the better. 

When I got to my room, I closed the door hard as I left.  With my entire body shaking hard and my mind shutting down again.  Well, sort of it, it was more like there were so many thoughts of panic and memory running through my head so fast that it shut down any chance of anything good happening. 

I came to around three.  Quickly I scrubbed up and went to my computer.  I drafted and came with a quick outline of what I would tell my mother.  I obviously couldn't tell her the truth, and when I had to lie, I always found it better if I wrote it down so that I would remember better and know where to look when the lie came up again. 

"Hello honey!" said my mother as I called her. "I just got an interesting note from the government today.  You're working for them?"

I felt my eyes widening.  Either Stephanie had been lying about me being the only hacker, or she was telling the truth when she said they were more than prostitutes.  This was a little surprising.  I mean, from what I saw and snippets of conversation I got that there were at least prostitutes in our group that were really "guards" no matter what they looked like, but why hide that.  Why have us as prostitutes and hackers instead of pretending to be prostitutes.  Wouldn't taking prostitutes to meetings be seen as weak and indulgent.  Didn't we want to seem strong.

"Um, yeah, I hadn't thought I'd get it, but I guess I did well on the whole computer tech thing with them," I said nervously, trying to come up with something on the spot since my first idea wouldn't work.

"Don't worry, I won't pry.  When will you e moving out of that Shoe Box?" my mom asked.  I rolled my eyes. "With your clearance when will you be able to see us?"

"Um, I'm staying until my lease is done," I said slowly, and rolled my eyes when my mom muttered about me being too practical for my own good and not taking advantage of the situation. "And I need some training or something before I get those kinds of privileges."

"They're so paranoid," said my mother with a sigh. "But I understand.  No more questions until your all trained.  You'll tell me when that is right?"

I nodded and she quickly changed the subject to show me the newest sweater she had made my father.  It was nice enough, nothing he would wear to work, but something he wouldn't mind wearing when going out.  My mom usually saved making embarrassing stuff for us kids and then giving us her big eyes in order to guilt us into wearing them until we could find some way to destroy them that wasn't completely obvious.

Once the call was done, I almost went for my new pad.  But the ears started to make my hands shake again so I went for my knitting again.  Seeing the sweater inspired me.  I think the whole "Snow White" thing that she started was stuck in my head.  I made a design with apples and twisting vines.  I almost ran out of yarn to work with and decided to check my amount and realized that I had enough after some had been taken out for my college loans.

I cursed when I brought it up.  I couldn't even afford my stupid apartment with what was left.

I got no sleep that night, and stormed down to my job with anger.

"Hello Jennifer," said Stephanie, not looking up from his paper as she worked. "How may I help you today?"

"How does anyone live on the money taken out of the account?" I asked, trying to stare me down.  She looked at me in what looked like surprise.

"Not many people do," she said slowly. "Usually they take out loans and get further in debt.  But we have places to sleep for free.  It's one of the... perks of being in this job.  We just didn't think you'd be interested.  Which, I got some interesting reports yesterday about your conduct."  I found myself blushing fiercely. 

"I don't really remember that.  I don't do guys," I said, looking away  from her.

"What if you got on the pill," I took a step away from her.

"Settle girl," she said, seeing my expression. "Having a hacker is very important me.  If you don't do guys, we can work around that.  Though, what did you feel about Amy, she said you seemed a little distant even though you... recipicated."

I gripped one shoulder and looked determinedly at the wall as I answered her, in painful details, what I saw and felt.  As I talked about what the other prostitutes were wearing and what I caught them saying, what I smelled and all those small details. 

"Can you do that normally?" she asked.  I looked at her confusion. "Can you tell me all those details if you closed your eyes and I asked you to describe this room?"

I shook my head.

"Hmm, interesting," Stephanie said, that small smile on her lips again. "What about Amy, she was concerned you might be more interested in Lisa training you than her."

"No," I said after a minute or so. "I like Lisa better as a friend."

"Right," said Stephanie with a laugh. "Then why don't you ask her to help move you to your new home today."

"Um, well, I still have the month paid for," I said with a blush. "And I told my mother I would be living there."

"Tell her that you found out you had to move," she said. "And this will be better for you.  You'll be able to have all your electronics to play with."

"I have more than the pad?" I asked. Stephanie just gave me an amused look.  I next thought I would run to my new desk so fast. 

When I got there, I realized that I was in over my head. Not because of the electronics.  On the back of the chair is what appeared to be my new costume, and under it was a bunch of yarn.  I took out some and my eyes went wide.  I hadn't seen such good yarn since I lived with my parents.  The first thing I was going to make was one of those cute little hybrid animals.

"So you like knitting, huh?" asked Lisa, turning from where she appeared to be applying makeup horribly.

"Um, yeah, why did I get all this?" I asked.

"Because what we make looks horrible, and your sweater is not," Lisa pointed out.

"We thought that as you train," Amy said as she came into sight, taking up my stuff. "You can spend some time doing stuff you like.  Amber said you thought we were an honest to go Stitching store when you interviewed.  So you obviously like it."

"I'm good at it, and it makes it easier to think," I said.  Lisa just stared at me for a moment before bursting into laughter.

"You really are that thick," said Amy, I glared at her, but she wasn't laughing at me.  She looked more devastated than anything.  I just rolled my eyes.

"It's fine," I said.  Not the perfect job, but at least I get to play with new electronics," I said, starting to go through the drawers and happy when I found all sorts of new toys inside.  Electronic, none sexual toys I mean. "So, what are we doing today?"

"Well, first you and me are going to get you into your new standard outfit," said Amy, waving her hand at the outfit on my chair.  I looked at it suspiciously.

"Am I going to have to wear this all the time?" I said, clutching at my clothes a little and glaring at my new ones.

"Whenever you're here," said Amy slowly, and I sighed.  Apparently I had worried everyone by being so violent on my new day.

"I'm going to be living here," I snapped.  Amy flinched.

"Then whenever you're on the clock and we don't have to you wearing something else, she said with a deep sigh.  I looked over at her with a raised eyebrow. She just shook her head. "We also need to see if you have any other skills."

"I thought my other skill was hacking," I pointed out.

"Yeah, but you're expected to act like a prostitute in some capacity, and we just got a contract that Stephanie wants you to go on for the end of this month," said Lisa.

"Lisa," snapped Amy, before turning and smiling at me. "Don't worry about it.  And I'm sorry about yesterday, I didn't know you were... I thought... when someone new comes in...."

"Why don't you wear clothes?" I asked her, trying to break her from whatever rut she had gotten herself into.

"I like being oh natural," she said proudly, running a hand down her body and smiling.  Lisa rolled her eyes.

"She used to be the Pocahontas," said Lisa. "Now she the Dryad."

"Don't ask," said Amy. "Anyway, let's get you ready.  I'll show you how to get into your new clothes and the makeup you'll start with."

It turned out to be a good thing that i didn't protest getting help getting into the new clothes.  There were a lot of twists or thread that needed tightening and almost made it hard to breathe.  I then turned to where I had a dark skirt with a slit all the way to the side.  I also was wearing a white shirt with embroidered flowers on the sides and those threads covering both of my sides.  Amy lamented that I had bigger breasts than her, and said I had nice silky skin.  She sighed as she looked over my new clothes.  Letting her head tilt to the side and a glassy look coming to her face.

Lisa coughed, and Amy seemed to snap out of it. "Well, I need to go to work in the club. But you need help moving tonight Jennifer."

With that Lisa left and an embarrassed Amy led me to the "practice/training room" where I eventually got a lot of laughing people.  I couldn't sing without making them all hold their ears.  Dancing made some of them throw food at me.  Serving meant food was brought wrong and ended up on the floor.  Flirting and being in close contact with men meant that I ended up giving a lot of black eyes, same thing with lap dances. Well, I could do girls, sort of, except that I tended to after a minute stop paying any real attention to my client which Amy told me they would find insulting. 

Finally they settled on me eating with clients.  Which I might have given them a weird look before.  They said it was because I showed to have a sensitive pallet.  I called them crazy.  yeah, my parents had been well off, but we weren't on the richest end of that scale.  But that fell on deaf ears and instead let one of the girls named Georgia feed me food.  She was on the heavier side and was a major flirt.  However, I soon learned that by being scathingly sarcastic to her flirting made her giggle. 

In the end they decided that I just needed a little more exposure to wine and alcohol and I would be perfect.  For the last hour before Lisa got off work I started on a doggy kitty.  Amy watched me in fascination.  She now had on an acceptable amount of clothing, most of it very loose.  I offered to let her try it, but she just shook her head looking completely uninterested.

"You two ready?" asked Lisa, sitting down next to me.

"You aren't," Amy said.  Lisa looked at her, and then looked back at her in surprise. "I can wear clothes.  You need to get some to help her too."

I briefly entertained the idea of telling her I didn't want her help.  But I also didn't want to hurt her feelings.  She was weird, but I didn't want to hurt her feelings.  She was the one who would keep me from going to jail after all, and she was teaching me things that weren't necessarily sex.  Creepy and in really uncomfortable clothes, but not sex.

Lisa changed quickly, her clothes more casual wear, and we headed up.  This time I took the elevator, wanting to get done as soon as possible.  it turned out to be a good thing it was all three of us since while I might not have a lot of stuff, I had enough that all three of us could just barely hold it between us. 

The bedrooms were down further the stairs, and I stored my stuff in a half closet half shelf thing that everyone had behind their beds.  There was no privacy here.  But I did get to go to the baths, and that was wonderful.  For one thing, like the bed and the space, it apparently cost nothing and it wasn't cheap either.  Sure it wouldn't get water probably as much as I got as a kid, but the water we had now was nice, couldn't have been filtered and used more than three times, and because everyone was so shameless, they didn't glare when a knocked into them when I floated.

Amy I noticed was a little on edge as she washed up, I didn't think she liked washing off her oils, and she was a very tactile girl by the way she got in people's spaces.  To let her know that I was okay with her, and that really she smelled and looked better without the oils I gave her a small kiss on the cheek and a pinch on the butt liked I'd seen a few others do.  She looked at me in surprise and when I smiled at her jumped me and began kissing me in earnest.  I decided having sex with Amy wasn't so bad.  It wasn't really the physical release that interested me.  It was more what I saw, heard, and felt, which might sound contradictory.  But let me put it this way.  I felt how water felt different than oil on her, I felt how hard the tiles were on my feet, and how the water supported me in the water, the temperature difference between where Amy was touching me as opposed to the water or where skin was exposed to air.  I saw all the people watching with lust or just interest, I saw that other people were also engaged with sex, and that it was just as often those of the same sex as not.  Lisa watched both of us with interest and she was close enough that I could see the green flecks in her blue eyes and that her hair looked like it had once been pink on the ends. 

We then headed to bed where I only tossed and turned a little before taking out my new pads and started setting them up together.  I fell asleep putting in new software. 


	4. Away from Home

Training was completely uninteresting.  The only hiccup really came up when I had a hard time putting and memorizing all the stupid makeup I was supposed to keep on me.  I had to keep it fresh, and I started spending every night in the bath.  I didn't go in the water all the time, but the makeup made my face feel heavy.  I hated it with a fiery passion.  I might have tried to hide in a corner and glared at Lisa when she came to get me.  I spent the rest of the day with weights and Amy finally got me something that helped.  I was really shallow when it came down to it.  I liked things that were pretty.  When Amy showed me some of the new designs and tricks they could apply to my face, I was happy. 

They then did one of the simpler ones with gems at the side of my eyes.  I admitted that it looked a little weird on me, and that I might need the bolder ones that had bigger sequins and deeper reds in the color scheme.  Also they tried to set me up with a guy for the feeding thing, and I might have almost shoved a fork in his eyes.  Georgia almost laughed herself silly.  She then gave me a hug and almost made me throw up by saying what kind of kink we were getting by being feeders and eaters.  Or however that meant.

Amy turned out to be a close friend.  She enjoyed touching, a lot, and I learned that I didn't mind it as long as it was her or Lisa.  Lisa wasn't interested in "sex with girls".  But she did like to cuddle, and she even started to show me, along with a few others how to fight.  Actually, that's how some of the guys were starting to warm up to me because of that.  Paul avoided me.  He was not a fighter, though I did get that he had another skill.  But quite a few of the male prostitutes were guards, actually most of the prostitutes with a second "skill set" were guards.  But the guys were the ones who usually had a more hand to hand style, and they liked teaching me tricks.  They said it was so that I would stop going berserk on people who touched me and instead would be able to calmly stop someone and make them stop touching me so I could explain I was "girls only" which became a bit of a joke.

I thought that they were all insane.  Including Stephanie.  On the whole, the situation was just weird.  I mean, sex was just something that I had always assumed  would not happen to me.  The biggest reason being that I wasn't the most social person.  I had been brought up with the belief that while guys did casual, girls waited until they were more sure and into a relationship they thought could last.  I never wanted or was interested in a relationship that would last as I didn't want children or the burden of having to entertain another person.  So I never really thought it was on the table, and truthfully I wasn't a "girls only" either.  Sure I touched Amy, but that was because she liked it, and she touched me because I don't think she got that while my body must have cycled through it, my mind was always somewhere else.  It didn't care about the sensations it was more interested in what was happening around it. 

Then I went on the floor.  Turned out that it did open at the lowest floor, and even though we "worked for the government" didn't mean we also didn't work for the masses at times.  The people that went there were more varied than I had first assumed.  They weren't just rich people that needed a break from the girlfriends and wives.  They had money, but some of them that watched the floor show were just making money. 

I was introduced to a middle aged woman who was sipping some kind of beer like it was champagne and looked at me in disdain when I was introduced as new, but then her eyes lit up when Amy then explained that I was "girls only".  We didn't actually find a quiet room, or even do it in the open as some of them were doing, but just talked and flirted a little.  She liked that I was awkward and used the term "cute" that I smiled at instead of groaning like I wanted to.  And while it was taxing and irritating and I never wanted to be surrounded by that many people in such a smoky loud place again, I was glad to shower off and spend the rest of my night with my electronics.

"So, you excited for tomorrow?" asked Lisa.  I looked over at her as I adjusted the outfit we would be wearing on this "diplomatic mission" as Amy called it.  This was apparently to go along with some sort of theme.  So I was in this puffy striped custom thing that made me look like a crème puff and garter belts that went all the way up my legs. 

"I suppose," I said finally with a sigh. "I don't think I'm ready."

Amy draped herself over my shoulder, the nubs of her breasts digging into my back as she practically laid on me. 

"Of course you are," said Amy and then kissed me under the ear.  I looked back at her, trying to give her my raised eyebrow, but then gave up and looked back at my huge mirror.  This outfit made me look more ridiculous than my Apple White costume did. "Remember, this isn't like the club.  You won't be expected to sleep with any of them.  They'll be all guys and we have prostitutes like me for the ones who just don't get what we're really for.  You're job is to hack into their system."

"Whose system?" I said in irritation, finally voicing what was irritating me.

"Well, see there's something we haven't told you yet," said Lisa sounding very nervous. "See there are other homes..."

"I know that," I said, cutting Lisa off. "But which one are we going to?  The Everest one, the Broken one, the last one?"

"The what ones?" asked Amy, looking at me.  I sighed, realizing that the hackers probably hadn't actually used the names, or that our government might have named these places themselves instead of going by what they call themselves. 

"I need to finish this," I said waving my pad around like I had needed time to get everything in order.  Really, without knowing more specifics I had no idea what other programs I might need to work on or where I might need to poke around for more information. 

"Well then, I'll go find someone else to play with," said Amy with a sigh, probably going to find some guy to have some fun with.  Lisa just rolled her eyes and went back to reading one of her magazines.  I sat with my back facing my mirror and started on my writing for the week.  It was due in an hour and I wanted to just get it over with.  This job really was a pain in the butt, and with all the training I had learning to blend in with the prostitutes, and getting used to my new systems and getting and building more systems. 

So what I had written about the last few times was rather hasty, and I can't believe that it had made much sense, but it was mine, and I had put my heart into every word.  I wrote something to do with intimacy that had to do and didn't have to do with intimacy.  It turned out to be wonderfully fun bit of nonsense that I was sure that I had left out important punctuation and stopped sentences in the middle of a thought before beginning a new one. 

I sent it off.  I didn't really need the money.  I ate plenty without paying a dime, I got an outfit that I had to wear almost all the time, I didn't pay for living space, or for hygiene.  Everything was basically taken care of.  Even my hobby of knitting and crocheting was free since they gave me the materials to use so I could make some things for the store. 

Still, I didn't actually want to stop writing to my mystery person. 

At the end of it I took out my needles and only stopped working on my mittens when she was done.  Amy then interrupted me by getting in my way and taking the needles out of my hands.  She then tried to roll me into a ball and rested her head against my chest with her naughty smile.  I pushed at her and ended up pining her, though I guess you could say she won in the end, much to Lisa's irritation.

When we finally headed off.  It was rather nerve wracking, mostly because I was a cream puff holding the arms of the government official.  He was in those ridiculous get ups with tight black suite and really nice looking shoes.  I also got the feeling he hadn't been told about the girl only thing because he was getting way to close and touchy feely and it was making me feel very paranoid.  Not just about what he would try, but what I would do when he tried it.  I wasn't sure I had learned enough not to seriously hurt him if his hands went any lower. 

Of course, except for us prostitutes, there were no other  women.  The entire thing was rather nerve wracking because the government meeting was at the other home.  Apparently it wasn't that far away, but that meant exactly nothing to me. 

We were bundled into what had to be a transport of some kind where we were bumped along and I found my fingers digging painfully into the wall behind my back.  They had tried to make the huge bumping car look nice.  It had obviously been a half hearted since it still looked like a steel trap, just with some odd design choices and horrible that cast weird and ominous shadows everywhere. 

We were given some small little pastries to taste and some sort of bubbly drink in a bottle.  I took small bites and discussed the taste and texture with the guy next to me.  He smiled in a way that was mostly irritating and made me want to smack him up beside the head.  I might have even tried to be a little more entertaining, if the guy would pay any attention to me.  I wondered if this is what I sounded and looked like while having sex.  Because if it was, I didn't get why Amy had named me her current favorite. 

Though, at least then I was just uninterested in sex, this guy also seemed to just be humoring me.  Like he was doing me the favor by talking about as something as shallow and boring as food, something I had only really started paying attention to because I needed something to entertain employees.  Personally I would rather be with the girl's or with my electronics and hacking into the place we were going. 

I have no idea how long we went on for.  Eventually the idiot I was with fell asleep a few hours then.  Of course, then I was stuck with no distractions since I wasn't allowed to play with the electronics in my sack until we were in our rooms where we would live for the next week.  Of course I needed to write and connect with mom while there.  Though only after I had set up a secure network.  Of course, figuring out what I needed to do to do that had taken some time.  Mostly I relied on other people to figure out not only what I needed to stay invisible to the computers and devices at this new home and be able to do and gather the information that Stephanie wanted.

Of course, maybe the stupid car would be less uncomfortable and stifling if there was only talking and giggling going on.  But many a girl's hand was slipping under the pants of the man next to her as she giggled and smiled seductively.  A few were bent double with faces hidden in their companions laps. 

By the time we were finally able to get off the sex rich truck, I was practically leading the government man by the hand.  I think I disappointed him, because he made some comments that made me think he thought he was getting lucky and I was just a shy prostitute that didn't want to do it where everyone could see.  I didn't see his disappointed face though because I disappeared into our rooms, practically curling in Lisa's arms when she opened them.  She didn't look to happy with her situation either.

"What's wrong?" I asked, while trying to drag her into a corner without seeming to be obvious.  The way Lisa was smiling at me made me think that she wasn't fooled by my maneuvering at all.  "Come on, you have that serious frown you get on your face whenever Amy hooks up with someone you disapprove of or does something reckless."

"Or you disappear on us," she said in a bored tone.  I felt myself flush.  I didn't disappear that often, and sometimes what they called disappearing wasn't disappearing at all, it was just me getting lost in what I thought of as my actual job. "I just don't like this job."

"But you love being a prostitute," I pointed out.  Lisa made a face.

"Our Lisa is a funny one," said Amy, seeming to appear from nowhere and drape herself around the blonde.  Lisa just frowned at the arms for a moment before moving Amy off of her and onto me.  I quickly discouraged Amy's hands from going anywhere to inappropriate as I wanted to talk and not mess around at the moment. "She doesn't want to be here 'cause she hates being a guard."

Now that threw me off balance.

"But you and your knives," I said, realizing that it was rather incomprehensible even as the words spilled out.  But Lisa seemed to understand anyway as she rolled her eyes and her fingers flicked in a disapproving way.

"I was a stupid kid," she said dismissively. "That's why Stephanie hired me when I came to her wanting a job as a prostitute.  Said I could only work for her if I also worked as a guard on some missions or she could tell the government that I did illegal street fighting and get arrested."

"She had something on you too," I said, eyes wide.  Lisa just looked at me in amusement.

"Yeah, well, I was an idiot.  Took me forever to realize those cock fights, ah, that's what type of fighting I mostly did, actually were hurting people.  I mean, more than just making them bleed.  A lot of the fighters were failed construction workers.  Hell of a lot of fun to fight, but I did take a lot of advantage of them being a few eggs short of a dozen."

"And yet you volunteered for this job," said Amy, a sort of singing lilt to her voice as she pressed the side of her face to mine.  If I ever had a space bubble, Amy has officially destroyed it. 

"Someone had to look after the two of you," said Lisa with an eye roll. 

"You're supposed to defend our government officials," Amy reprimanded Lisa, though she sounded more teasing than serious. 

"Yeah well, I might have to save Frank if he doesn't stop ignoring what his boss told him and keeps trying to get into our Amazon's pants," said Lisa while rolling her eyes. 

"So he was told I was 'girls only,'" I asked, using air quotations that other people apparently found cute.

"Of course," said Amy, leaning her head against my shoulder. "And he should have listened.  When he was told that you had a problem with men but were going on this mission anyway he should have realized that you had an important second skill set.  Really, you're more important than him, and he shouldn't have to have us spell it out to him for him to get that."

I didn't know what to do with this information.  Part of me thought it would be easier to tell Frank what my second skill set was, but the cautious and rational part of me pointed out that would probably only cause more problems.  After all, while most had been able to figure out my second skill set had something to do with electronics.  No one asked for clarification, and it quickly became clear that you really weren't supposed to talk about it.  It was a secret.  That's why they were all posing and trained as prostitutes also, because they were supposed to seem harmless.  If too many people knew I was a hacker, than word could get out to other homes and I would either not be allowed to travel, or be carefully monitored while I was there and not be able to properly do my job.

"Alright, get off Amy," I said, pushing at her.

"Oh happily," said Amy, running a hand down my sides.  I pushed at her and huffed a little in irritation.

"Not what I meant.  I have work that needs to get done.  Go play with someone else," I said.

"Looks like Rose could use some cheering up," said Lisa helpfully, tipping her head toward one of the giggling girls who had given at least three of the government people a hand job on our way over.  Her skin was a different sort of dark than  Amy.  While Amy was careful oiled caramel, Rose was more a sun burnt coffee.  She had hair cut short, and I hadn't had many chances to meet her.  She was Stephanie's second hand woman, always in meetings and running things down in the den where all the prostitutes lived. 

I took out my gear and started to set up my stuff.  It wasn't long until  was writing page upon page of code.  It turned out I was in "Neverlast" or "Home Sweet Home" as the proper name was.  I liked Neverlast better, but that was just me.  However, soon i bouncing signals and about as invisible as I could be.  If someone knew to look for a hacker, it wouldn't be impossible to find out that someone with pads outside their home had piggybacked onto their system and had gone to great lengths to seem like they weren't there. 

I first got used to what was immediately available to them and what they preferred to read.  Turned out the also had a video sharing files, but what they allowed through was much more racy than what we would ever allow easy access to.  They also seemed to have less books, or less interest in long stories with imaginary worlds, history, and fantasy.  Their stuff much more philosophical and speculative.  And they at least talked about what they thought was outside their home's wall.

Then I was kicked.  I glared up at Amy who pet my head and started to help me put everything away.  Then I got to put on my makeup.  That part I didn't mind.  The costume made me look like a crème puff, but the makeup was this weird twisting thing that involved enough glitter to be something I enjoyed looking at even if it looked silly on me.  Amy was smirked at me, and Lisa called me Amazon woman. 

The government official Frank offered me his arm when he found me in the line coming out of our room.  It took all my will not to glare at him and run him over.  I did not like him.  I don't think he liked me much either.

Then we were brought to a dinner we weren't allowed to attend.  I am not kidding.  I mean, I'm obviously not that into food.  I spent more than a few months than a few months happily eating bars.  But at least then I was given the nutrient I needed.  Now I had to watch as bunch of officials sat around a table eating food while I stood slightly in the background and looked pretty.  Rose had explained it.  This was meant to show power for our side.  Though I found this odd when the only woman on the others side was the leaders wife who while not talking out loud looked very ingrained in what was going on. Her hands idly playing with her napkin.

I was bored stiff, and let what was being said go into one ear and out the other.  If they were talking about anything important than it was all in code.  Which was just annoying.  Why couldn't they just say what they meant. 

"Not good," sighed Amy next to me.  So they were talking about something important, and the talks were not going well if Amy's tense body was anything to go by.  She met my eyes and smirked. "You want to do something a little more fun."

I glared and shook my head.  We weren't there to cause a scene, just to act as some weird sort of decoration.  Seen but forgotten quickly.  I had a feeling whatever Amy had in mind would stick in our host's head.

"Don't worry, it's Rose approved," Amy whispered, coming closer and closer to me.  I couldn't help but lean a little away from her and looking over toward Rose.  Rose met my eyes just briefly enough to nod in my direction.

I sighed in resignation, which apparently meant I approved of whatever silly thing they had planned.  Amy quickly had me in a tight hug and kissed me hard on the mouth.  I grimaced a little and sighed as she pushed me between the chairs with a little bit of giggle she leaned me over backward, making quick work of the useless showing crème puff shirt while I let my fingers make quick work of hers.

The government officials on our side looked everywhere from mildly surprised, to surprised but calculating, to Franks furious expression.  I was going to have to deal with that later, I just knew it. 

The other officials, well, now that I was getting a closer look, some of them looked weird.  Like they were almost shimmering.  They looked down at us mostly in disgust, especially the shimmering people.  Then as Amy's hands moved downward, I caught the wife's expression, she was strained but there was a weird glint in her eyes and I realized that what I thought was a chopstick to eat her food, actually had charcoal at the end. 

I glanced to where her husband was casually looking down at what was written, miming as if whispering in her ears, and then taking the napkin as he did so in hand and replacing it with a slight flick of his fingers.  It was actually rather seamless.  With a giggle Amy pushed her off me and she gave me a quick kiss.

"Sorry," said Amy with false modesty that even the other government officials could see. "You know how it is when women get in the mood."

One of the shimmering government officials actually stood at this point, pounding his hands against the table and leaving the room.  The rest left, the leader the only one who stayed to whisper to ours. 

Amy linked hands with me and gave me a little nod to me know that we had done the right thing, no matter what it looked like.  I lazily did up my buttons wondering over what I had seen.  Thus, it was quite a surprise when Frank pinned me to the wall, a furious expression on his face.  I looked at him in alarm, and his smile turned from just anger into something a bit disconcerting and creepy as he apparently was trying to smile.

"If you wanted to have a bit fun, you should have just followed me to my rooms.  They're small but cozy," he said and then snorted. "Really, I know you're new but even you shouldn't be so stupid as to..." and then he trailed off and there were hands everywhere and then a bang of a gun went off and I found myself dragged into the arms of my friends, the panic leaving my head little by little.

I saw that Frank was furiously fighting against some of the more 'Amazon' looking prostitutes that had come with us and that Rose and the government leader were sauntering in the middle of the chaos.

"Is Frank bleeding?" I asked.  Which had Frank cursing me and calling me all sorts of stupid names.  I looked over at Lisa.

"You shoot him in the ear," Lisa told me, and then gave the man a rather dead eyed and irritated look. "Not that he didn't deserve it.  He was warned."

"What the hell is the use of her if she can't even do her job?" on the upside Frank finally said something coherent.

"The distraction wasn't her idea Frank," snapped the government leader before he glanced at me and the Rose. "But why did Stephanie send such a volatile newbie?"

Rose sparred the man a quick glance before turning to me. "What did you see Jennifer?"

I started talking.  It was something to concentrate on even as my body shook hard.  He looked at me as I just spilled things that I hadn't even consciously realized I was observing, but was sure of anyway.  Little things like the clothing difference.  What each person looked like, the distinguishing features that I could remember.  I also included the little facts like the shimmering that I had seen and how the wife, Nelly apparently, had been writing to her husband (Gavin).  Our leader watched me with widening eyes as I continued to speak.

In the end I was completely out of breath, and looking at him and hoping that nothing would go wrong.

"Well, she still needs some training, for one thing, she can only really do that during sex of all things," our leader looked at Rose like she was insane. 

"That was definitely informative.  I'll need to have a talk with our Intelligence officer about getting her proper training," he said.

"I believe Stephanie hoped that was what you would say," said Rose with an easy smile and a shrug. 

"Very well, Frank, you are to treat our," at this the man stopped and with a smirk looked me over, "big Snow White like you would any other woman on our staff.  Anything less and you'll see yourself back on the ground floor before you can blink."

Then everyone was leaving, a couple of officials followed by prostitutes, many of them who I had identified as guards.  Fun and protection all in one I guessed.  My electronics were shoved into my hands and I smiled and curled around my real work happily.

When I finally did come out of my work, I glared up at where Lisa was smiling down at me. "You know.  This new training is going to cut into my real work."

"It's important.  We have some girl's who can observe as well or even better than you, but we can't use them every time, and it's always good to have as many girls as we can get observing," said Rose.  I jumped a little at her voice.  It was rough, the sort of voice that came from living exclusively with the construction workers.  She didn't have the scars to show her as a former construction worker. 

"But I can bring up the video of that day," I said, flipping around my screen to show her all the video from the four cameras the people from Home Sweet Home had set up.  Rose looked at it in obvious interest before looking back over her shoulder. "Tiger Lily, there's something I want you to look at and include in your notes."

Tiger Lily came over, a young woman with coconut skin, as they called it, and two braids with ribbon weaved in.  She had her own simple pad with her, and set herself up with my computer to see one camera at a time with a writing pad at her fingers.  I went to my own pad and started gather all the information that I could find.  Finally Lisa dragged me from my work and set me to cuddle with Amy. 


	5. Dragons

When I woke up I felt positively crowded.  It ate and made my skin crawl in complete irritation as I tried to find another corner that would be best to hole myself away in.  Then it all came crashing down.  Within moments I had everything I needed and was back on the net.  I ate a little that ended up on the plate with every tiny tidbits of food. 

And then I was dragged away to do more pointless standing.  Then I was expected to sit on Frank's lap.  I leaned and smiled like I was happy.  But every time I saw the bandage on his ear.  Not that he didn't deserve it.  I would have felt bad if I had killed him, but this was more of a warning than anything else.  I think he got that I hated him as much as I hated him because he gave me that same smile.  I think even the officials from the other side knew something had gone wrong. 

By the end we left each other in a huff, and I went back to hacking my way into more government files than I could count.  They ran their house much more different than ours did.  They had very little interest in the military and making sure they were ready for anything.  Well, at least less interested from defending from potential human inside or outside invaders, and even seemed to be trying to train "animal professionals" to work with the attack from "dragons and the like."

"Dragons?" I asked a distracted Amy.

"The huge creatures found in big deserts, the tallest mountains, and the deepest parts of the ocean," said Tiger Lily, whose real name was Adora and spoke in clipped tones and often smelled like a mix of metal and roses. "Don't believe the old images on the net or in the movies.  They are huge and scaly and usually have big teeth but that was at least a little really."

"Oh," I said, she glanced up at me.

"I've been to HSH quite a few times," said Tiger Lily, cocking her head to the side as she considered me. "The creatures created when human fled to their homes are well catalogue them. At least the ones to do with the desert and plains.  Most of the traditional animals we read about in literature no longer exists, they've all been altered.  At least according to these people."

Now that I found interesting.  I then spent more time with my computers.  Which irritated Amy to no end, but it did help the week just slip away.  Soon we were back in that horrible contraption of a car.  I went to Amy who happily had us put on a show for the guys.  Frank did not complain, and Amy's government man definitely didn't complain if his creepy smile so close to us was anything to go by. 

The good thing about going to the HSH, or Home Sweet Home, was that now I could get on their network easily.  They were the closest home to our home, and I had a feeling that soon it would be easy to get on any network as long as it wasn't too far away.  Now I really had no free time.  I apologized to my parents that I didn't have time to meet them or talk to them as much as I wanted. My time was taken up by hacking, learning new hacking tricks, learning to be a prostitute and even working the floor a little from time to time down at the Den, and making stuffed animals to put on the shelves, though I never worked at that store.  Then three days a week I now was taught observation skills. 

The first day was rather disconcerting.  I sat with a woman who had huge rimmed glasses and explained what I could do, and then told her how I did it.  She obviously thought I was insane.  She finally gave me a long "OK" and told me to come back the next day while she talked with some of her colleagues about how best to train me. 

I actually became something of a novelty to the Intelligence girls, as they were called.  It wasn't that they weren't used to training prostitutes that Stephanie sent them.  It was just I was the only one that was best at it while having sex.  Actually they said it was positively mental when you really thought about. 

On the day that something perfect happened, everything seemed to snap into place.  I was busy, and not all the work was to my liking, but I was happy.  Certainly happier than when I had started.  I didn't really like sleeping in a room and eating with everyone else.  It was overcrowded and I often felt like all air was being squeezed out of my chest.  It didn't help when Amy would confirm that no place was my own and she curled up next to me when I was still sleeping.  I didn't like it when she tried to wake me up with sex.  She had tried that twice already.  Turned out that I was a very violent person when I wasn't thinking and working on instinct.  I struck out and popped her in the nose in the first time and she fell out of bed.  The next time I gave her black eye.  Now she would just curl up carefully with me and blow lightly on my nose and eyelids until I woke up.

"Wake up sleepyhead," said Amy, her entire body on me.  I opened my eyes and glared at her before closing them again and trying to curl back into a ball on my bed.

"Are you trying to get hurt?" asked Lisa, and suddenly the weight was off of me. "This is her day off."

I opened my eyes a little to see Lisa trying to drag her away from me.  Amy was glaring and doing some sort of acrobatics.  Lisa thankfully wasn't traumatized by this because Amy was wearing some clothes, not much, but a little bit.  Enough to cover some of her breasts and well... Actually it was sort of funny that I was still a little shy to think about certain body parts and sexual acts when I saw them a lot these days.

But Lisa was right, I did have one blissful day off after one very awkward conversation with Stephanie where she "checked up on me" and "praised how well I was doing despite my limitations. 

So I waited for everything to go right, which, predictably, it never did.  Because Amy was evil and they kept me awake when I had a day off.  All I needed was one last thing.  And then it happened.  Slowly at first, but it spread little by little until I was awake and ready.  Then I jumped up and ran for the baths.  Sometimes all the soul needed was some water.  Amy was quick to join, and Lisa followed soon after.  Tiger Lily (as she preferred to be called) joined us, using our "Den names".  It felt weird to have someone who wasn't a client calling me Snow White regularly, Caramel for Amy, and Butterfly for Lisa.  The Butterfly had a funny story to it.  Apparently Lisa used to carry around a butterfly knife in everything she wore. 

Afterwards I got to go to the gym.  Then Amy and Tiger Lily went to work at the Den and I took Lisa to meet the parents.  Of course, Amy pretended to cry at this.  Lisa just pointed out that Amy couldn't act decent if she tried.  So I was taking home her nice girlfriend to meet her parents.  Tiger Lily then told Amy to grow an ovary and stop crying before she hurt her.

"Jennifer, you came home!" said my mother giving me a big hug.  I smiled and hugged her back. "Come, I've made something for you."

I walked over and smiled as I was handed a very fancy hat.  I missed the days when I could wear what I wanted.  Sure, that day I got to wear my usual full outfit with a glove and hat and everything else that made me feel better about being a part of the crowd. 

"Here," I said giving my mom a little pig figure I'd thrown together.  My mother cooed over the thing with a wide smile. Lisa gave me a look that let me know she was completely freaked out. "Don't worry, you weren't expected to make anything."

"Well, I mean, I made some cookies," said Lisa, showing a little tin with the stuff she had thrown together when I asked her a few days ago. "I don't know how good they are.  It's been a while since I tried to bake anything and our stove is horrible."

My mother squealed. "Oh, is that why you got leave from work so soon?"

I looked at the woman like she had gone mad even as she bounced.  What was she talking about? And it had been four months since I had started "government work" and this was the first time I properly got to see her.

"Honey, Jennifer is finally dating!" I gaped at her.  How had she jumped to that conclusion?  "Oh, what is that look for?  What do you think, that we're from before the Homes were built.  Whoever you end up with we'll be happy."

"I think she's just surprised at how perceptive you were," said Lisa in her careful voice as she took my hand.  I looked behind her and she just shrugged. "Plus, we've only been going out three weeks and our relationship isn't...traditional."

"What does that mean?" my dad asked, peeking out from where he was making dinner.

"Maybe they have another girl in with them," said my brother, throwing his legs onto the table. "Hey sis, I'm just finishing up college.  Thought I might apply for a government job myself and see you around more."

I seriously hoped that wasn't the case.  Explaining that to my parents would be murder.

"Ew," said Lisa without missing a beat, her face scrunched up in complete disgust. I had a feeling that she was thinking that she was thinking of Amy.  I laughed and 'explained'.

"We have a friend who loves to flirt, but we're more interested in companionship then the extra-curricular stuff. That's what she meant by it not being traditional," I said, bumping Lisa with my hip and hoping that I sounded genuine.

"Like a friendship roommate situation?" asked my brother.  I rolled my eyes and nodded.  That was good enough and would work.  Lisa really wasn't into girls.  She'd do it if it was required of her.  But you could tell it wasn't her thing and that the only reason she wasn't hitting the other girl is because she couldn't be as unstable as me.

"A little deeper, but whatever," said Lisa, smiling when dad took the tin of cookies from her. "Something smells wonderful.  What are you baking Miss...?"

"Call me Ophelia dear, and I have to admit that I hadn't anything to do with it.  My husband is the one making it," she said.  Lisa actually looked shocked at this.

"I always said I had two mothers," said my brother.  My mother took one of her pigs out of her shelf and threw it at my brother.

"I'm sorry about this Lisa.  We're not exactly a normal family," said my mother.

"Better than no family," Lisa said with a wide smile.

"Oh you poor dear," said my mother, giving Lisa a big smile.  We spent the evening eating.  Lisa had my mother eating out of her hands.  I was convinced that what she was saying started out innocently enough, but it wasn't long before Lisa knew just what to say to have my mother wrapped around her fingers.  My father was a little harder for her.  he wasn't sure about this no sex thing and getting a child out of it.  Though since we were two females it would take a surrogate or adoption to get a child so I didn't know what he was complaining about.  No, but everything Lisa said was gold to my mother.  To the very little Lisa spoke of her government job that included being a guard, not a soldier since she was female and they discriminated that way (which made my mom cluck) and that we met when she was assigned to the building I was at.

But when really reeled my mom in was what she said about her upbringing, which if it was true, which I had a feeling that it was, with only the less savory bits cut off.  About an orphan girl who was brought up not on the 2.5 floor, but in the basement.  Now I could see how she got there to do her fights.

When dinner finished up we only stayed another hour before taking the elevator and escalator back to the Homemade Stitches.  Melanie who I swear somehow got a job only being the front desk person somehow and was a little jealous of, only glanced quickly at us.  We headed down to where Tiger Lily and Amy were cleaning up after the night.  Apparently they had already washed as Tiger Lily still had the towel in her hair. 

"Jennifer," Amy said, bouncing my way even as she twisted her hair. 

"Clothes Amy," grumbled Lisa as she went to her desk.

"Prude," sang Amy back at Lisa.  Amy draped herself on me, but thankfully she didn't make to take off any of my clothes.

"Can I help you?" I asked Amy, shrugging.

"We got off, now you can have with all of us.  Unless Lisa wants to be a wet blanket?" said Amy.  Lisa didn't even bother to answer, which I guessed meant she was coming with me. 

"So how were your parents?" asked Tiger Lily. "And you need to add more information about what you said to the guard you ran into when leaving.  Stephanie is requesting it personally."

"They think I'm dating Lisa," I said, letting Tiger Lily steer me to me computer.  I flipped up the lid and hit the button to turn on and make the machine start whirling.  I was half afraid my words would send Amy into another fit of hysterics, but she looked unfazed, maybe just a little annoyed. 

"How did that happen?  Lisa doesn't even like girls.  Well, I mean she likes you, but you have sex with me," said Amy sitting next to me.  I went back to my computer and started writing as fast as I could.  I really hated reports.  Tiger Lily looked at me in irritation went I sent it right to her email without double checking me grammar or wording.  All my reports went through her, otherwise they were apparently incomprehensible.  

"Technically, Snow White doesn't like sex, she likes lifting weights, thus she is more intimate in her own way with Lisa than you," said Tiger Lily in what I swore was a little teasing in her deadpan voice.

"I hate all of you," said Amy, obviously pouting. "Maybe I won't invite any of you on my trip around the entertainment district."

"I was already invited," said Tiger Lily, hitting what I assumed was the button to turn my write up to Stephanie. Really, I was surprised that Stephanie read them and she didn't delegate that to someone else. 

"And you need to put on clothes," said Lisa as she touched up her makeup.  I just lounged on my chair.  Amy went to her desk and started to put on some clothes that while rather ridiculous and invited the eyes to look at her.  I didn't have to do anything.  That was the nice thing about liking clothes that covered most of my body and avoiding makeup whenever I could.  I might like the way makeup looked, but I still hated the way it felt, and really, it took too long to apply and keep up with. 

Finally the other three girls were ready, and Amy put her arms in mine and Tiger Lily's arms.  Apparently I wanted to push her buttons, though I gave the excuse that I had to hang onto to Lisa because she was girlfriend.  Lisa must have wanted to irritate her too. 

"So, what was Snow White's family like?" asked Amy. "They as spotless as I'd imagined?"

"She has two mothers, apparently," said Lisa.  Amy looked at her completely unimpressed.

"If that's all you got, than her family is as boring as nutrition bars," said Tiger Lily in her usual deadpan. 

"Well, one of her mother's is technically a man," said Lisa with a smirk.

"And not a drag queen or a transvestite," I added before whatever they were doing got out of hand. 

"Still, feminine?" asked Tiger Lily. I shrugged.

"In some ways. He likes to cook, and while mom knits, he sews.  He's also into romance movies, and he's always the one who helped pick out our clothes when growing up," I said.

"That explains why you dress like a nun," said Amy dryly and then snorted in laughter. "What about, you know, the skin thing?"

"What skin thing?" I asked, and then rolled my eyes.  Most people were not so tackless.

"Just her dad," said Lisa over me, before correcting herself, "and her brother.  How come you guys are so pale when your mom is dark.  I thought that dark skin would have been a stronger gene trait, or however you say that, whatever."

"I'm not a different race," I said almost laughing.  The idea seeming completely absurd.

"Well, what else could be?  Unless your family is just really into skin bleaching," said Tiger Lily. I roll my eyes.  For people who got around they should know that there was only slight variations in skin color but nothing as drastic as the old sites indicated.  People did skin darkening and bleaching for the same reason that we called our huge compounds homes and tried to assign floors to them. 

"No, it's apparently a genetic defect," I said. "Unlike your eyes or Stephanie's hair."

"My eyes were a generous gift from a thankful client," said Lisa, sounding like she was a second away from sticking her tongue out at me. "Was a poor girl like me going to turn that down?"

"Wait, I always thought you were from the rich district," said Amy. "I mean, you always implied..."

"I fought down in the basement.  How did that make you think I was rich?" asked Lisa, looking at Amy like she had lost her mind.

"You always said you were a stupid girl taking advantage of construction workers," said Amy. 

"Yeah, because I thought they were weak.  They had every chance in the world, and they couldn't make it?  That just seemed retarded to me.  I mean.  I was stuck in limbo with no prospects it seemed at the time. Without a birth certificate I had no chances," said Amy. "It turned out that I didn't need that to at least get this completely disrespectful job."

"So, how badly did Rose beat your ass when it turned out that you used to beat up construction workers?" asked Tiger Lily.

"Oh, she thought it was great sport.  She actually encouraged me to continue until I told her that I wanted to concentrate on my job instead of street fights," said Lisa, we all looked at the Butterfly she shrugged. "She saw what I was doing as honorable.  I think if she thought I was ashamed of my actions, then she would feel insulted."

"And Rose..." I said.

"Figure it out yourself," said Lisa brusquely. 

"Really, you get to point to my skin color, which is practically against the law according to anyone who has even heard about school.  Why can't I ask why Rose has an accent?" I asked.

"Because she'll black and blue if you go behind her back," said Tiger Lily. When I raised an eyebrow at her she rolled her eyes. "She was brought up by construction workers outside our house.  According to her they still work there.  She's the black sheep in her family, but that doesn't stop her from being protective of them."

When we finally made it to the entertainment corridor, the lights had been suitably dimmed to make it look like it was night and the entire area was crowded with college kids, those just out of college, and teens that wished they were in college. 

We spent the night out, which was as it had always been when I actually decided to go out with people I knew.  I mean, I think I was a little closer to them then I had been to my other homes.  After all, these friends not only knew what I had always kept secret, that I had hacked for fun, and well, there was the whole sex thing, but that didn't make us closer as much as make things really weird.  Though I still had something in the background.  My theorist thread that now, more than ever, I actually wanted to see if they posted somewhere on the net and exactly where it was and what the people who were reading it got out of it. 

That night all I could keep was the press of the crowd and smell the bodies all pushed together, most clean, but many hardly washed or not smelling the best from having to use subpar baths with water that had been used time and time again.  Cycled more than water should ever be. 

I didn't have the next day next.  That day was when I got to train as a prostitute, which was less about eating lots of food to learn all the stuff my palate had to be sensitive to, so much as it was Georgia trying to coax me to say and make the right kind of physical signals that would make clients think I was interested in them. 

Then I got in my Snow White outfit and dabbed on my makeup.  I put a tiny little apple mark on the corner of my mouth.  It would look assume, or at least weird.  But I wanted to try it, and Amy had approved of it, so the powder to make my face almost a perfect white and lipstick a fresh blood on my lips.  With the thickness of the stuff, I practically feel like it was going to drag me to the ground. 

Then we were done in the Den.  By now, most guys knew better than to approach me, not that I had attacked a client yet, but even if this was the "ladies" section, some men just weren't that bright and needed a couple of muscled men to glare at them or even escort them out of the door five times.  Apparently an Amazon Apple White was not okay. 

Tonight was rather boring, the only hiccup came when I ran into a transsexual.  Thankfully I didn't punch him.  He had a wonderful cover up, disguise, whatever the correct term is for me to write.  I didn't know if he... she was going to get surgery.  The fact of the matter was that she had not.  Without the surgery, to me, for sex purposes, which with her money was where we were heading. 

I refused to deal with it.  I had already spent time with people who didn't want to be a drain on society and wanted to pay for their surgery, yet had money to spend on sex with me, and wanted me to treat them like they were girls.  Which, fine if we were just talking and flirting, I could do.  But once I found you had body parts, no intimacy.  I don't care what your mind is telling you.  My mind will flip the switch to kill mood.  Not my fault, I'm unstable. 

I told this all to, Max, who was a transvestite, which I had to remind myself was different enough that he really shouldn't be looking at me with those eyes.  I just glared at him and stressed that I was crazy and would react to a penis without thinking.

He just continued to glare at me until the woman actually tracked me down, put his arms around me, and felt me shiver.  I felt his body stiffen, thankfully realizing that the shiver was not of pleasure but of fear he actually backed off.

"She's girls only because of trauma.  We would be grateful if you would be discreet but also got the word out," said Max, looking ridiculous in his bows, but apparently that was the point I guess.

"Of course," said the woman with a deep and sigh that dragged at her lungs. She looked at me with big eyes.  I gave her a quick kiss on the cheek.

"I am so sorry," I said, but the rest of the words got stuck in my throat.  I wasn't even sure what I would say and I was glad for the powder because he couldn't see how red I had gotten.  Light skin really wasn't useful most of the time. "How about I come visit you after my surgery.  I should be back on my feet in just a couple of weeks according to my doctors."

"I would love that," I lied with my best flirtatious and lusty smile.  After all, if he looked like the girl he had primped himself today he had a nice build and face build that would make people love him.  Not surprising he was stuck in the wrong gender while being so lithe.  Not that meaty guys couldn't be girls on the inside... We might not have the old problems of skin tone (race, whatever), homophobia, but the changing genders thing.  That's what really got people's blood boiling.  Anyone else talk about the others, they were radical or insane.  Transgender was much more uncertain, what with the surgery being free to whoever could "prove" they had been born with the wrong equipment.  Still, was I using the wrong pronoun still?  The whole politics of the thing made my head spin, and that was even before I had to care. 

That was the end of it, and the woman left and Max sent me one more irritated look.  I glared at him one more time before I went back to the floor.  I found an old favorite there.  We got some nice bubbly champagne and I led her to one of our most fluffy pillows.  After that there was only one more client I had, well, technically Wren or Songbird got two best friends who wanted to add a little excitement to their lives.  They were also girls only, but apparently were too shy to approach me. 

I think I must have given them an incredulace look because they both blushed and look away.  Then I ordered something sweet.  I gave them the tart, explaining what they would taste.  I connected with one of them, her eyes closing softly as I described the taste she was experiencing as she bit down, and then we kissed and Songbird led us away.  Having sex with three other people was odd.  That is the only way I can explain it.  There are too many limbs, and there wasn't enough to see to make the situation interesting.  I got an alright workout, but I was bored silly. 

Finally, after the night had slipped away and it was actually near dawn, I finally got back to my desk.  I fell back in my seat with a sigh.  I yawned as I got the clumps of makeup on, and cursed the night and Songbird for that last tumble.  Really, I only got two hours of sleep before I had to wake up and get ready for more lessons on observation. 

The blankets felt cool as I went under them, and I was out almost instantly.


	6. Reality

I woke up screaming.  At first everyone assumed that Amy had slipped into my covers to play a little, but when Amy sat up in her own bed with a sleepy "what's going on" apparently it got everyone moving.  When I finally did settle enough to see people around me and fall into familiar hands, only friends were there, though I could see some concerned and irritated faces in the crowd. 

I blushed fiercely as I pushed at Tiger Lily's hand, not wanting to be coddled.  I didn't even know why I was so embarrassed.  Everyone had nightmares.  Everyone struck out in their own ways, especially when they slept.  Even if they had come into prostitution on their own, well, being a prostitute had its downfalls.  It technically was illegal.  Technically, which basically meant that the government didn't want to deal with us.  They left it to us to police our Dens.  That meant that there were always idiots that got in here and there that thought they could get away, rough up, or assault one of us just because the police wouldn't get involved. 

These were idiots, but it turned out there was no end to them. 

Because of this stupid assumption by stupid people, Lisa was big on all prostitutes, not just guards, to get some training in fighting, at least in self-defense.  Stephanie said that as long as people learned on their own time and it didn't cost her anything, she did care.  She already had enough to keep organized.  Of course, finding a time was hard, and finding a time where Lisa was also open to teaching at the same time as you wanted to be taught was almost impossible, but every once in a while someone asked for teaching in at least the basics.

I dipped my head in the water, letting my head float on the top while I took slow breath in.  Since I woke up fifteen minutes early, I had the time.  Amy tried to distract me with sex until she realized that even the idea of it at the moment had me hyperventilating in a corner.  After that she disappeared while I went to dry off.  Amy then reappeared with my regular clothes.  I looked at her in confusion.

"We'll say it's for the kink tonight," Amy said.

"And if they visit the Den tonight?" I asked.

"You won't be working the Den tonight," said Lisa and Tiger Lily at the same time. They met eyes for a quick second.

"You'll see Cat tonight," said Tiger Lily after a pause.  I looked at her in alarm.

"One of the bondage chicks?" I asked, how in the world was that going to help me?

"She's also a trained psychologist.  Technically she never did her internship though, but then, Dr. Everett had her license revoked for being a pervert, so she's good," said Amy happily and then shrugged when I looked at her. "When you show signs of a nightmare connected with sex, you get the day off from the Den and have to see the psychologist."

"It's rule," said Lisa with a sigh. "And since your such a quick trigger anyway, that's what has gone wrong."

I glared hard and shoved my hat on my head.  The training had been as tedious as always.  They had really boring tests to make sure I didn't get touchy.  Apparently they didn't tease me because someone had shown them what happened when I was harassed.  The girls walked on eggshells around me while they were raunchy with everyone else. 

After I headed back to work, I might have tried to hide away and not see the psychologist.  Though I did take my computer with me.  I curled up and after I finally finished my blog for my week.  When I finished I decided to surf around the HSH internet.  Getting around the blocks that had been put up half heartedly had tipped me off that I should hide my tracks. 

And then I found it.  Completely by accident while surfing around there net in their popular sites, I found a link to my site.  At first I thought that something had gone wrong, but then I started reading the comments.  There were so many, it was actually sort of frightening.  There were a lot that apparently thought I was crazy or were irritated I wasn't concentrating on the right thing.  They asked where I was, why I was so quiet, why I hadn't addressed more important issues. 

But there were complete idiots who kept writing about how I had helped clear something up with my random writings or how I had inspired important questions.  Then I read on and on.  It wasn't a fluke that I had so many comments.  I mean, I'm not saying that in HSH I'm so popular I'm a household name or anything, but enough people linked me, and talked about me on their own blogs that I found myself blushing hard at everything I found. 

"What are you doing?" asked Amy, making me jump and slam the laptop shut tight.  Old habits kicking in I guess. 

"You can't hide from Cat here.  You'll make her break out the leather," Amy said, when my head snapped to hers she raised her hands. "Careful, you keep acting like a rabbit and you'll... No, no don't tremble.  God damn it."

That was all I really remembered besides tears and shaking until I unwound myself from a painful grip around my body with Cat in civilian clothing and glasses looking down at me.

I looked around frantically, trying to see any hints of Stephanie.  Afraid that she would give false promises laced with threats about how I had to get better or else I was going to end up in jail.

"Let me first say, before you freak out again, that Stephanie will not get rid of you and hand you over anytime soon.  You're the only hacker she has at the moment, and that makes you just a little too valuable," said Cat, crossing her legs. "By the time she does find someone, you'll have so much dirt on her, that she'll make sure you either very happy, or not around anymore."

"Is that supposed to help me?" I asked.

"It is at the moment, but since I've seen your psych evals.  It'll hit you tonight or early tomorrow when whoever is watching you will bring you to me again," she said, her voice low and melodic.  I knew I was being manipulated.  I felt better for being able to figure that out.  Usually things like that went right over my head. 

"Who will be watching me?" I asked, letting my head tilt to one side.

"Your friends," she said and offered me a bowl with little candies on them.  I unwrapped one and popped it in my mouth.  Tasted like caramel, but not like Amy.  A bad joke, but I knew better than to laugh.  I hated psychologists.  Not that I had to see many.  Just when I was nine when there just seemed to be death after death of people I knew, a couple of them not from old age by accidents.  I freaked out and first holed myself in my room, then ran away, then wouldn't stop crying, then kept saying goodbye to everyone I met while crying. 

Then I learned to not show how freaked out situations made me because then I had to meet some grumpy man who wrote in a notebook and had meds mixed into the food I got that made it really hard to concentrate, which I didn't think helped at all because my grades suffered, which made me worry I was a letting my parents down and that I would never get my job.

Yeah, I hated the meds.  So I learned to tone down the panic.  I learned tricks, way of distracting myself and ways to breathe that would let me go until I was safely in bed before I would break down every night as I curled on my bed, and every once in a while I would hide under the bed.  I was off the stuff within the month.  My parents did not believe in meds so as soon as my psychologist would sign off on it, they took me off the meds.  Which was a completely relieved. 

"You're spacing again," said Cat, but instead of being accusing like the rest of my friends, she looked at me with a raised eyebrow. "When did you start doing that?"

"I know I started doing it as a copping mechanism.  I did it on purpose," I said, not interested at all in playing games.  I considered telling her that in HSH I was famous just to see if it got an actual reaction of surprise or something since she had put this feeling of unflinching.  Like anything I said would just roll into her and with no problem she would analyze it and help me help myself.  I really didn't like psychologists either. 

Moments ticked by seconds by seconds as she just stared at me, as if waiting for me to say it.  I decided not to tell her.  Being the Theorist was still my secret.  Not even my employer knew who I was, and about reading what people thought I was like, even the little taste I had gotten, I was not going to tell them the truth.

"I freaked out when I was little.  I learned tricks to stay calm until I was somewhere safe and secluded," I said, trying to be nonchalant as I sat there, almost trying to copy how the other woman was sitting.  She smiled at me like she was being indulgent. 

"I don't think they were entirely healthy," she said and I huffed and tossed a foot before she could continue.

"I'm not taking meds again.  They make my head fuzzy and sleepy.  I won't be any good at any of my jobs," I snapped.

"Alright, how about we work on some meditation then," Cat said.  I just stared at her, trying to figure out if she was joking with me. 

From her stare I was afraid she hadn't. 

"Seriously?  That mumbo jumbo?" I asked.  The whole idea was silly.  I got the breathing thing.  I mean, when I had panic attacks then my breath was usually the biggest problems along with my mind.  Meditation was supposedly about breath and controlling your mind.  But the whole thing sounded so ridiculous. 

"You don't want meds?  Then you do some meditation," she said.  I glared. 

I did give in.  I was half afraid that if I didn't they would start hiding my use of meds in the food they get in my meals every day.  The whole thing was really boring, and I fell asleep once in the chair as she tried to move me through some sort of thought exercise.  I told her not to feel so bad, because I usually had a hard time sleeping.  So the fact the meditation made me fall asleep was a good thing.  She just gave me that stupid patronizing smile and had us do a different meditation. 

I think she had worked long enough to know when her patients were going to be completely unhelpful and probably hurt her, because when I was just convincing myself that it would be good for me to kill her and hide her body, and I could totally make it look like an accident.  That was when she sent me away.  Lisa met me in the corridor as I walked away.  It was almost time that some people who be thinking of heading to bed, but instead I let Lisa lead me away and we lifted weights for a while. 

I was mad that she seemed to be supporting the idea that I needed to go to the crazy lady, but I decided not to blame her.  After all, maybe she thought I had to go to Cat or Stephanie would throw me out.  Or something equally as horrible. 

Thankfully I was not stopped from going to my pad before bed, staying up way past when it was healthy just looking myself up.  It was weird and frightening, but somehow wonderful at the same time.  All these people read what I wrote and took me seriously.  It made me want to do better.  Of course, maybe that 's why my employer had never let me in on how well I was going or forwarded any of the responses I got.  Because there was no way they didn't know I wasn't from another home. 

Clicking one by one, it took me awhile to get it right.  I read and read and read.  I had a lot of ideas, and I brought up my computer and just let my fingers go and go, and then I fell asleep.

For once I woke on my own.  No alarm to shock me awake or Amy snuggling me even nightmares.  Cat had been wrong, I hadn't actually come up with anything.  I yawned and stretched slowly.  A little bit of fear made me shiver and look for my electronics, they had been stacked by my bed.  They wouldn't let anyone on them after they were shut off, and from what Cat said, my friends would have been watching me in shifts through the nights.  That meant that, well, hopefully, that they would have respected my personal space and not looked through my stuff.

Plus, these were prostitutes with seconds jobs.  It was basically worse than being a crook.  What could they tell anyone about what I was doing that would get me in trouble.

"You awake yet?" asked Tiger Lily.  I glanced to where she was leaning on the bed to the right side of mine. "You're wasting my time."

"And how do I not waste your time?" I asked slowly.  A small smile spread across her face, slow and sure. 

Apparently I had the day off.  Tiger Lily had it with me.  She spent the day using our paces to get onto the ground floor and basically played the big eyed tourist.  But it was actually sort of fun.  Tiger Lily tried to hold  onto the aloofness of hers, and her voice remained that monotone.  She did however want to pet every single animals we came in contact with and took pictures of everything. 

When we for the first floor all she talked nonstop about everything she saw.  She really did remember everything, in excruciating detail.  Then we went general shopping.  I pointed out we didn't need to buy anything, but Tiger Lily asked what was the point of getting paid if we didn't get to spend it on something that we wanted.  I found nothing I wanted in the novelty shops, well, no, I found this nice little necklace with a small heart pendent, but it looked horrible on me, so instead I got a dove for Amy, earrings with musical notes for Lisa, and a decorative pen for Tiger Lily. 

I smiled as I bundled it all up and then went to wait outside the store for Tiger Lily to finish up.  I would wait until I was no longer watched, and then wait until all of them were gone and as many prostitutes as I could hope to be gone, and then I would hide the presents in their covers.

That was the weird thing about working with these people.  Prostitutes did not steal from each other.  Well, no, I suppose that wasn't completely correct, there were always rumors floating around, and things would turn up missing from time to time.  But they were found quickly in most cases and the person was looked on with the complete pity that I knew if it was directed at me, would break me.  So stealing happened, just not that often.  Someone had tried to steal one of my pads once, apparently he ended up in front of Stephanie, I just hoped he was still working with us and hadn't disappeared.  At lunch we met Amy at store where Tiger Lily said goodbye and Amy was somehow dressed appropriately enough that we could go into public without causing a stir. 

She took my arm and led me to a small little restaurant on the 1.5 floor where she ordered my food.  It was a breakfast thing with lots of sugar that almost made me drink lots and lots of water so my mouth didn't get overwhelmed by the taste.  I smiled at Amy as she chatted away.  Either she didn't notice that I hated the food, or the fact I wasn't coming out and telling her was seriously entertaining her and she had no qualms about letting me suffer through the sugar attack. 

When we got back to our rooms, Amy had me pick up my satchel of toys as she called it, and brought me to one of the training rooms.  I set up all my stuff and started hacking away, when I glanced up and realized there was a reason for Amy to be slightly toned.  Those rod like things that were attached to her hips weren't there to "give the customer more leverage" as she told me the one time I did ask.  They apparently were a type of energy weapon. 

That was awesome.  I had never seen a real one before.  They were supposed to be for the soldiers, and only the best.  There were always rumors that some were circulating the "black market" but I had never read a report where a murder used one of those weapons to kill.  Really, I had started to think that they weren't really a thing and that the theatres had just made them up because they were cool. 

But here Amy was, practicing aim and maneuverability with a whip.  There was something unimaginately right about Amy's weapon of choice being a whip.  For one thing, it just went with her.  I didn't even know if I could put into words why it fit her, the simple fact was that it did and it was assume.  The way she moved with the was inspiring. 

I closed down most of my devices for a tie just to write a quick creative writing piece inspired by watching the colors fly and dance around each other and Amy flipped and twirled and aimed. 

By the end, I got very little of actual use done and Amy was sweaty and itching to have fun with someone.  I was surprised when she didn't just jump and start kissing me the moment she was done.  But instead, she simply hit a button to make the two tails disappear and told me to pack up.  It turned out that it was time to go and see the therapist again.  Oh, lucky me.  This sort of thing, with my friends on a sort of rotation of watching me, sleeping, and getting a fraction of my work done went on for three days before Amy said Cat thought I was well enough that well, as Amy put it, "could we please have sex now". 

It was early in the morning, I was had just sent the weeks theorist blog out after picking through all the little things I had written for those last few days, and I didn't mind indulging Amy when she had been such a good friend, when Tiger Lily of all people was called.  What I mean by that is that one of the prostitutes, her name might have been Meg and her stage name might have been Glitter threw open the door and yelled three times that all friends of Tiger Lily were to go down to the Den and be ready to help. 

I met Amy's eyes quickly, before the other girl was helping me stand up and we were leaving in a sprint down the stairs to see our friend.  Tiger Lily was a wreck.  I mean, it wasn't like she was me, comatose and fighting.  No she was just distant, repeating "fight or right" over and over again while digging her nails so hard against her skin that she was actually bleeding.  It was Wren who actually got Tiger Lily to pay attention to me, but it was apparently me that had really set her off.

Well, no, that wasn't completely true.  Apparently, from what one of the bouncers could tell.  The customer had been antsy and disagreeable all night.  So Tiger Lily had taken him to a room to try and get him out faster by giving him what he said he wanted.  He didn't get rough or anything, but he did start moralizing apparently.  It happened, that someone who came for sex was so scared of what they were doing that they lashed out against the girls instead of themselves.  But something in what he said triggered what she had seen in me when I fell apart, and thus had set her off. 

Like a horrible game of dominoes. 

So I awkwardly held Tiger Lily to my body, talking about complete nonsense as we went up until we got to Rachel, another therapist, the one that Tiger Lily had apparently been assigned to.  Then I was sent to bed.  When I woke up I was given a revised schedule so I could help support Tiger Lily. 

Which brought up one question.  Alright, more than one, but one that was important to me in that for some reason it seemed benign to ask at the time.

"Were you trailing me around because I was on suicide watch?" I asked after looking over things I had to worry about with Lily and the best ways to help her cope.

"Nope," said Lisa, not sounding insulted that I was making this all about me instead of my focus being on my friends. "With you we had to make sure you didn't go berserker and start seriously hurting everyone around you.  Tiger Lily was brought up with a different problem.  She self destructs.  To others that's a relief, but to us..."

There was a long silence.

"You shouldn't blame yourself," said Amy, putting a hand on my shoulder.  I looked over at her in confusion. "It wasn't your fault that this happened.  These things happen in waves.  We all get the blues once in a while.  Even the therapists.  That's why we have therapists.  That's why we have more than one therapist."

"Are any of you staying though?" asked Wren, appearing in our corner while Lisa went to watch the bed where Tiger Lily was sleeping. 

"If you mean for the next trip..." I said with a flourish and then shock my head. I had a feeling that my name would be appearing on most of the lists of who was going to other homes until Stephanie found another hacker.

"I think Tiger Lily is supposed to go too," said Lisa, and quickly added, "she'll be fine by then.  She bounces back quicker than anyone I know from a breakdown."

"That's what concerns Rachel," said Wren dryly. 

"Well, Stephanie can't let Tiger Lily's gifts go to waste, so just stop worrying," chided Lisa, standing and stretching. "And in the end, that's a good thing.  The more Tiger Lily is distracted from thinking about everything she knows, the happier she is.  You know that better than anyone."

Wren might have known it.  But she wasn't happy about it.  That night she showed it by doing the worse I've seen anyone do at the Den that night.  She was snappish toward clients, and even when she wasn't, she never seemed to be trying and a few times I was sure she was trying to just annoy them away from her. I started to worry that Wren was going to be the next victim of this supposed wave, and started to try and pay attention to who hung out with her as she wasn't really my friend. 

When I brought this to Amy's attention though she just laughed and laughed herself silly.  I decided to let the subject drop.  It wasn't long until two days were done. The good news was that we finally got to head out and see another home.  The bad news was that I wasn't sure how all my friends and Wren were doing mentally.  Tiger Lily had gotten the okay, but Wren watched her like she thought Tiger Lily would fall apart at any moment.  And Wren was acting more and more jittery and more and more paranoid.

Of course then I had to open my big fat mouth to Amy again. 


	7. Age of Consent

It actually appeared to work.  It turned out that Wren had a kink.  That night she got me with the two other girls, yeah, she liked having more than one sexual partner at a time.  Thankfully this one didn't involve me.  I didn't really want to be bored to death, and I kinda thought they were walking eggshells around me and sex still.  No, instead Amy apparently got an official to take both her and Tiger Lily "for a spin" as soon as we got to this new Home.  Called, irritatingly enough "New Home" or as the hackers sometimes called it "Originality Inc."

This time we had a few guys come with us.  They were bulky and apparently completely meant for the use of the officials from this new place.  I learned that our male diplomatic leader was Ken and that most thought he was competent enough to do his job, but overall mostly an idiot. 

It took e mere second to break into this places systems.  Partly because I had already been able to connect to them and find their stuff, I just hadn't thought to go deep in what I was doing because I was too lazy to find out the name of the place I had hacked into. 

Diplomatic missions here were weird.  Partly because their side actually had women in their versions of suites, and I got "paired" with one of them.  It had actually almost been like this weird sort of ceremony to it.  The woman was on the older side, and while she had a mouth on her that would make a carpenter blush, she didn't actually do anything really sexual with me. She didn't even cuddle she just talked.

I didn't have to say more than a couple of words when I was supposed to be "entertaining" her.  She would just ramble on and on about how everything was better, but no everything as worse, and this is why it was better and this is why it was worse.  And she didn't actually stop on that until my mouth got away from me and I said. "Please move on."

She looked shocked at my interruption, and I was scared stiff and trying to find something to say that would placate her when she burst into laughter, catching and throwing a tear from her eyes as she shook her head. Then she did change the subject, just to ramble some more.  I groaned and let my head fall onto my hands, the woman just cackled at me and scooted over so she could run her hands through my hair and talk at me.

"I don't know about my assignment," I said as I sat down next to Lisa and took my satchel from the corner. "I think she's trying to drive me crazy."

"At least she likes you," said Amy, carefully starting to unwind one of the many feathers from her hair.  We were once again all dressed up in costumes to match.  Now we looked like birds of all things.  Our costumes were essentially thin threads with feathers and gems laced into it.  And I refused to call what was on my face makeup.  It was not makeup, it was face paint.  It was gaudy, bright and it made us all look like we had beaks for some weird reason. "I got her a year ago.  She hated me."

"Like you didn't encourage it," said Tiger Lily.

"Really?" asked Lisa looking over at Amy.  The girl just smiled at her cheekily. 

As I got all my stuff turned on and plugged in, I noticed Wren stumbling toward us.  I stood quickly, a little concerned.  But when I got to her, I saw that she was holding a disco ball.  I quickly went to help her carry it next to my computers.

"What is this for?" I asked, stopping only last second before I kicked it.  Not good to kick fragile things, no matter how tempting it was. 

"Well, it's supposed to be for our room.  But it's a little weird that it has wires coming from the top of it.   So I'm going to say that you broke it by accident and take it apart," said Wren, leaning back and letting her back crack along  her spine.  She smiled at her glare. "Oh, don't worry about it, form what Amy has said about your dragon lady it was she will love you more if she knows you're a little clumsy or thinks you might have destroyed something along the way."

I looked back at Amy who nodded, but then looked away.

"Why are you angry at me?" I asked.  Amy groaned and Lisa laughed.

"She doesn't want to talk about the dragon lady," said Tiger Lily then she actually looked up at me. "Don't worry, she'll talk you rear off later.  Rose just got sick of her muttering and told her off."

I then got to work, glancing at where Wren was working not far from us.  We have thirteen prostitutes with us.  Still ten female prostitutes and thee male ones.

"Alright, now what are these little things?" said Wren after a time. I looked up to see a small electronic.  I scrambled over my stuff, took a picture, and ran it into the database.  Good thing that I had found a way in now that I could directly connect to the program. I looked at all the pieces scattered on the ground. 

"It's a scanner," I said. "I need to find the numbers on this thing."

"Sure, let me take a look," said Wren, opened a cloth and selected a bunch of very delicate tools.  With a light and a  microscope she looked over the entire thing.  I went over it piece by piece. Then she took the little thing apart. "Ah, there it is. The number is 265."

I gave her a smile, and then the blood went out from my face.

"Um, talking, sound," I started saying, wishing that I had tried to learn some signals.  Had I really been so busy that I thought it wouldn't be important to learn.  Wren just looked at me like I was insane, her head cocked to the side like she really was some exotic bird about to fly away with her shiny trinket. "We already sent a pulse into that thing.  Any electronics in that thing are dead and even if they weren't it's a little late to be doing nonsense words," said Tiger Lily in a bore voice.

I glared at her.  I didn't care how much common sense she was using, I was freaked out, and had never done this before so she should just but me some slack.  Tiger Lily predictably kept her eyes on her report and didn't look up at me once.

"Paranoia is healthy here, though," said Wren playing with the little senor in her hands. "So you know what this can do?"

"It's just for movement according to this," I said, looking down on the page I was on. "Are you sure that's all you had?  There aren't any that look a little different?"

"Let's find out," said Wren, brandishing her ratchet and a very scary smile spreading across her face.  She went back to completely mutilating the thing.  It didn't even look remotely like a disco ball anymore. Just wire, pieces of black plastic, and some shiny reflective surfaces crumbling to the ground. So Wren was an engineer, or something close to that.  Her sexual kink might have been doing it with more than one person, but the way she took the disco ball apart let me know what she really loved to do, and it was engineering, or reverse engineering in this case.  Some things she didn't need my help to identify.  She found the thing that was supposed to catch what we were saying, then took it apart. She found a couple of pieces that were supposed to make it seem natural a disco ball would need wires.  I'm sure the people at this Home told Wren about these features, and wisely she ignored them. 

Finally she found a sensor she couldn't identify, different in a subtle way from the one she gave me before, so she had me look it up.  It turned out it was a mini camera.  Now that got her excited.  Amy must have heard some of what was going on because she called them perverts.  When I turned to give her an exasperated look, I realized that she wasn't saying it idiotically but fondly. 

Right, prostitutes, they couldn't live if there weren't people that were perverts. 

"Songbird," drawled an irritated voice. I looked over to see a prostitute I didn't remember seeing before.  I was pretty sure she had burnt her skin, but then again, people thought I bleached mine.  She looked a bit odd, though it was hard to tell if it was the outfit she had been given, or if it was just her.  She had changed into the second costume we had (given because the feather were difficult), the one she wore was dark clothes that were supposed to be lit up in tastefully tantalizing ways.

In other words neither Amy or Lisa were allowed to make it. 

Actually, I wanted to meet the prostitutes that made my costumes.  I had no idea what I would do, probably just glare at them grumpily. 

"Hello Spider," Wren said perkily. Spider raised an eyebrow at her snorted.

Actually, the term spider fit really well with.  She was very small, dark, and all limbs. 

"What is wrong with your eyes?" I asked.  The Spider looked at me, looking a little more than just irritated.  I scouted toward Amy, dragging my stuff with me.  Lisa was stronger, but Amy had some sort of power.  It took me a while to realize it since she spent so much time having sex and playing around, but then I realized that she only had the most loose schedule.  In other words, she made it herself.  She went to work when she put herself on the schedule.  She acted flighty, but she was also always at Rose's side, or keeping an eye on Rose as she ran away.

"What are you doing here?" asked Spider, eyes snapping from me to Wren, looking only a little less angry as she looked down on her friend.

"Have a fun time," said Wren, apparently not paying attention to what Spider was saying to her.  Spider's expression softened and she leaned down a little to give Wren a hug around everything that she was holding.

"I'll see you later," she said and then left.

"Intense," I said going back to my computers. "That's one of Wren's friends?"

"Why do you want to know who her friend..." Lisa trailed off and I heard her sag against the wall. "Oh, you worry too much.  Wr--Songbird has calmed down."

"There's Tiger Lily, Mars, Shakes, Lyre, and all of us now because Tiger Lily told her you were our hacker and then you were useful," said Amy, glancing over at Tiger Lily.

"She works with electronics and is the best we have in that field.  Snow White is our hacker and thus knows about it too," said Tiger Lily looking completely nonchalant. 

"That makes sense," I said, then I frowned at Tiger Lily. "Why didn't you tell me about Wren.  An electronic person is good for a hacker too."

"I wanted to see how long it would take you," said Tiger Lily, finally seeming to get bored of what she was looking at and putting everything away.  She leaned back as if she were getting comfortable and she smiled at me. "If we don't bed with our person on this trip, then we get to sleep in this bare room.  Personally I want to hug whoever sent Spider out tonight, these people deserve it."

Amy snuggled into her side and Tiger Lily shared a kiss with her before they both seemed to fall into a deep sleep.  I looked over at Wren, but she was still working.  She looked so happy as she worked away.  I started to turn down my stuff.  It took a little bit, but eventually I found some cream and remover and got the junk off my face.  I gave what was left to Lisa and she cleaned up before snuggling into me.  This had to be the most uncomfortable place I had ever fallen asleep. But somehow it didn't take that long.

I was woken up by being jostled.  I looked to see Lisa pushing at Amy who was in the other woman's face.  Lisa looked less than impressed, actually a bit furious.  When Lisa elbowed me in the ribs I lost patience and threw them off me.  I started looking at what I could see of my costume to see if any of the feathers were out of place or folded up.  I found a mirror, scattering the guys already checking up their chicken costume there. 

Nothing was too badly messed up.  Then I found some makeup to fix things up.  One of the girls, I think her handle name was Bright, helped me put it on so it looked right.

I still thought I looked like a clown.

Within the hour we had gone back.  I decided that I liked HSH better.  It wasn't because I had a tiny little fame there, it was because this home was completely creepy.  I was left with the Dragon Lady again.  This time she asked questions and waited for answers.

"So why are you really here?" asked the Dragon Lady. "None of your officials are women, and they gave you to me."

I waited for her to fill in.  There was a brief moment when I wondered if they had heard something and that there had been another way to hear the information. 

"Then I'm here with you," I said slowly.  The woman smiled and I looked at her teeth.  How had she gotten them to be so disgusting.

"That's because we have an understanding.  You people don't tell me what you really are, and we don't kill you on sight by giving new people to me to figure it out.  Now let's not play games, they're so boring.  Just tell me so I can tell you all about my imaginary nieces and then tomorrow you can get assigned to the right government official to best give you a warm bed and a way to do your job," she said, leaning back. 

I just stared at her.  If my friends knew that this woman was crazy and would pull this and left me to defend myself I was going to kill them.  Well, I wasn't going to help Wren.  I was going to send Tiger Lily the most incomprehensible updates and not correct them, I was going to avoid Lisa, and I was going to deny Amy sex.

The old woman sighed with fake irritation.

"Here dear," she said taking my shoulder and taking out a pad and showing it to me.  There was a picture of a dark creature, a soft noise, and then a blank screen.

"Was that supposed to mean something..." I asked slowly.  She really was off her rocker.

"I believe the girl who just took out that murdering sociopath is called Spider.  She's quite good at her job, though I swear that your silly men think that the men you bring are the ones to do these dirty jobs."

"I don't like sex," I said.  The woman looked at me. I tried to give a smile. "That has to be something for a prostitute right?"

"Fine, we can play this game," said the woman with a sigh. "What do you do for fun dear?"

"I write," I said and then thought for a second. "And eat."

"Not to talk to wonderful people like me?" asked the Dragon Woman with a sigh. 

"I don't really like people," I said still smiling. "And I hate this makeup and this costume.  I hardly make it as Snow White. Forget about being a bird of all the idiotic ideas."

"You want a go at my pad?" she asked.  I took it, and then titled my head.  I hit the screen a couple of times.  Finally I had found the place for where I could write things.  It was slow and meticulous with a few false starts.  After all, I had never seen this sort of pad before.  I let my hand hold above the screen before turning to the Dragon Lady. "Where is the keypad?  Do I have to have hit something."

"Sorry," said the Dragon Lady, taking it from me, her eyes going slowly over me. "Forgot I had sensitive information on this."

"... You gave someone you thought might be a hacker your pad?" I asked.

"Personal Handheld, and we call the programmers," said the Dragon Lady.  I just shrugged my shoulders looking to where our numbers had thinned.  It was a little weird.  I guessed that each place was a little different.  Unlike HSH, this place didn't want us there when important meetings were going on, basically we were the fun while they had downtime.  Only one girl got to go as a "personal assistant".  Which meant Tiger Lily got to take off the feathers and wear something that almost looked professional.   

"That's nice of you," I said.  The woman rapped my knee with her cane. "Why don't you like Amy?"

"Who?" asked the woman.  I gave her a lazy smile.

"Sorry, I'm new, obviously, Carmel," I said.  Looking back over the group and ignoring her.

"Ah, that scamp.  She's a pain in the rump.  Never could stand anyone with a sob story," she said, I gave her a look.

"I've never heard her try to make someone try to feel bad for her," I said trying to bring out my inner Tiger Lily.  I didn't like this game either. 

"You aren't an infiltrator are you," I was forced to look her in the eyes, but I put space between us by pushing myself onto a rail that led to a soft of platform where Wren was playing some sort of card or tile game with three men.

"I don't think that's what they're called," I said.  I let my legs swing a couple of time. "I don't really like you."

"No one likes me," said the Dragon Lady. "I told you this will all get easier when you tell me what you really do for your people.  You get the young man up there on the right of your engineer.  He's quite nice.  Works in translation I think, and is quite hung."

"I'm girls only," I said, and then sighed, looking back at the Dragon Lady. "And sex doesn't interest me.  Your fine."

"Yes, yes, but you should at least pretend in some ways that prostitution is your real job," said the old woman, hitting me on the side of the leg. "Really, won't you tell me instead of being so ridiculous?  I mean, you're admitting that prostitution isn't your thing and insisting that's all you are."

"I don't get this game," I admitted. I was probably supposed to be more discreet right?  But no one told me what this old woman was really like.  Had she not interrogated any of my friends?  I mean, I wasn't an idiot.  I knew Spider was an assassin and that she sort of got caught on tape.  And they knew Wren was an engineer, but that could have found that out if we hadn't gotten rid of the listening devices where we stayed. 

Why did we speak so openly when staying in another's place?

I sighed.  I would probably freak out about what Stephanie and Rose would do to me falling on my face so badly on this test later.  For now I was just sort of annoyed.

"Your fingers are digging into your skin," I looked first at the Dragon Lady and then at where my free hand that wasn't holding the railing was bidding into my leg.  She looked me over and then sighed. "Here, play this game with me."

We spent the hour we had left passing her personal handheld back and forth and playing word games.  She actually refrained from saying much this time. 

Then she excused herself, and I headed back to the room.  While all the officials were supposed to be at the meeting, there was only me, one of the guys, and Amy who was bent over something, her concentration complete on what she was watching. I took one look at my computer and ran over to Amy.

"Someone was in my stuff!  I need some supplies to destroy what I can before I turn it on," I said, grabbing her by the shoulders.  She looked shocked and then smiled.

"Yeah, they do that," Amy pushed me off of her and stood. "I'll go see if I can get Wren.  Don't hurt the Dragon Lady in the meantime alright?  It would be a pain to explain."

"I'm not consciously violent," I pointed out.  Amy just laughed.

"I wouldn't think any less of you, neither would anyone else.  Violet may even give you a chance," said Amy and then giggled.

"Right," I said.  I should probably know by now who Violet was.  I decided to blame Amy for being the reason that I didn't take the whole being more careful thing seriously.  And wasn't that a weird idea.  I had been the most paranoid person ever, at least that I knew, and somehow when I got blackmailed into this nightmare, I hadn't thought to learn everything that I'd have to know to keep the facade up.  Alright, the prostitution thing sucked, and I had avoided it, but I should have treated it like I had when I thought I had to hack.  I should have started by worrying about how to keep myself in the dark.

"Stop thinking," said Amy, appearing with next to me and wrapping her arms around. "I'm sorry about not telling you more about this place and the Dragon Lady.  We didn't let them touch your stuff, but they did get Erik out for a little while, so don't play with anything until Wren gives it a look."

"Right," I said and stared at it.  Truthfully I was just a little bit disappointed in the whole thing. "I hate all of you."

The rest of the day dragged and I waited as things just crawled by little by little.  Things like little random thoughts, and random prostitutes, and my supposed friends who were also prostitutes, and I wanted to just go back in time and yell at whoever decided this was going to be my fate.  I decided that while I was an idiot, and Stephanie was evil, and the government was too close minded.  In the end I decided to blame most of my problems on the people who made the tests. 

Maybe it was because I had just been blaming them all this time as it was.  They were the easy target.  The people on the waves and posting on the internet always said that blaming the tests was juvenile.  Only children did that, and only whiney entitled ones at that.  I had always wondered if they got adults from that small percentage of the population that didn't have to take the tests or were so hard off that if they got something they didn't think would work, they didn't have to go to college.

No, but those people got to bitch right?  Got to write about how they spent what was supposed to be their college years working in retail shops fourteen hours a day in the job they were stuck in for the rest of their lives.  While us college kids.  For those years we were blissed out.  If was our fucking failed or weren't ready for a job that was our problem.  Forget that we couldn't get a job outside the campus because were only allowed off them for certain hours and once a month to visit family so very few of us got what could even begin to call on the job training.

Really if we couldn't get a job it was our fault.  Forget that the teachers and the classes had been useful. Forget that I had somehow made all A's and B's and still couldn't do accounting.  That was my fault.  And fine, some of it was.  I could have spent less time getting extra money doing dead end jobs like my blog and babysitting for my professors and I could have actually learned on my own how to do things. And yeah, if I were into heavy drinking and partying and basically being really loud, then I would have had the best four years of my life.

And it wasn't that I didn't enjoy it. Those were easy years when the debt of each second I was on the campus seemed like a distant horror story that just had to work out somehow.  And it wasn't like those bloggers weren't right either.  They called people like me, those who bitched and blamed the testing more than they blamed themselves until they screwed themselves over or ended up back with their parents as leeching deadweights, as children.  I still thought of myself as a girl.  I still saw myself as that broody, unsocial teenager, and I was in my twenties, just, but I had graduated and I was of age.

"Hey," and once again, Amy was right in my face, not even an inch away. "What are you thinking about?"

"Privileged problems," I said with a chuckle and a forced smile.

"Well stop it.  We can't have you having another meltdown.  Dragon Lady always acts weird when she does that to one of us, I don't like it," said Amy.  She snuggled me under my chin and then seemed to decide she liked being there and I had to adjust as she folded and forced her way into my lap and flush against my body.

"The Dragon Lady," I said with a sigh.  Not really trying to say anything at all. "Why doesn't she  like you Amy?  he mentioned something about hating sobs stories."

"I love trips like this," said Amy after a few second of my question.  I sighed, but didn't push, she didn't have to talk about it if she didn't want to. "My dad always looks so uncomfortable."

"What?" I asked, jumping just a little in shock.  Amy must have anticipated this reactions because she held me tight and only chuckled against my collarbone.

"Yup, born a politician's daughter, probably in a better corridor than anyone in our little Den.  All nice and secluded with a woman from the shops my dad called a whore and no one to hear him yell and lose his temper or at least no one stupid enough to try and get themselves involved.  You want to talk about privileged problems: I'm your girl.  Never went with food or clothes.  Never had to worry about my job because my dad said I was too useless to get one and could go to college to be a writer," she laughed at this, she turned so she was properly sitting in my lap and reached down to curl one of her hands in mine. 

"Then, I just lost it.  I mean, when your rich and your dad's more paranoid then even you are Snow, then you learn to use a weapon, and when your instructor is insane and on something hard that makes his brain fizz and crackle on all the shows he's been watching, he teaches you to use a whip, or maybe teaches it to you because he thinks your dad watched one too many old shows and wants you to be able to reach around and use the thing cracking your back to hurt your abuser.  Who the hell know.

"But I had a little bit of self-defense and I knew a lot of bullshit, and a week after the sad weird passing of my mother, bless her weak, redirting soul, well, I went to the basement and went searching for a job as a whore, because my dad always did say I was my mother's daughter.  Course they had better security and background checks than I had given them credit for.  That sucked, but what the hell I thought.  And tried to kill him at a big meeting.

"I was stopped and hired.  Course, I had to watch front two years before I got to do anything really fun," she said.

"Why?" I asked.  She laughed.

"The whole age of consent thing.  We take that seriously in our Den if you haven't notice.  With all the government goons always around we sort of have to," she said.  There was a very long silence.

"That sounded rehearsed," I said finally.  Amy laughed as she lifted my hand to her face.

"It's too good a story not figure out the best way to tell it," Amy said.

"And how much is actually true?" I asked.  Amy looked up at me and then just started laughing.


	8. Real Trouble

Amy didn't do anything that let me know who her dad was.  For a little bit, I thought that I was sure it had all been a lie that she made up to entertain me, then she smirked at me and made one middle aged government official get angry and almost attack her, just by treating him like she did everyone else.  At least I didn't think she did do anything different.  Of course, she could just trying to do something insanely dangerous, creating a situation in which it seemed to legitimize her crazy back story.

Needless to say, I was happy to get home.  Apparently in a week we would be hosting some of the "entourage" coming with another home's people.  I didn't need to worry about it beyond know that Amy wouldn't be around much and that there might be a group of people hanging around that I shouldn't bother. 

So I put the home with the Dragon Lady behind me and made Lisa teach me how to be sneaky.  Then I asked Tiger Lily, and then I asked Wren, and then I almost asked Violet.  Basically friends are completely useless in that way. 

"What do you want?" I asked when someone stopped behind me as I was idly looking through videos on the net.

"Me," said Wren happily.  I rolled my eyes and spun my chair around.  If anyone made me almost feel my age, it was Wren.  She was really smart, but very young and chipper acting.  I didn't know if it was just an act, but her attitude did make it easy to underestimate her.  Next to her stood a young woman.  This prostitute was thin and lithe, with soft eyes, and a powder face.  She had the "shy maid" look down pack, and she blushed and looked away when I looked at her, her throat bobbing under the choker. She was wearing as she swallowed nervously.

"Hello Paul," I said. "What do you want Wren?"

"I'm here as Paul's moral support," said Wren, her smile almost sheepish as she pushed the boy forward.  He looked terrified.  Not that was new. 

"And Paul wants..." I asked looking at Wren since Paul didn't seem to be talking.  Wren just pushed Paul forward. 

"I'm not going to hurt you Paul," I said, feeling bad and exasperated all at once.  I just wanted to watch some videos in the little free time that I had. 

"Can you find pictures?" asked Paul in a voice so soft that I hardly heard what he said when it became clear that Wren wasn't going to talk for him.

"Pictures of what?" I asked.  My mind tried to think of anything the transvestite, the transgender, the drag queen... "And what do you preferred to be to be referred as?"

"Paul," he said with a cheeky smile.  That was just irritating.

"Fine," I drawled, my irritation overcoming my paranoia of being obviously rude to people. "Wren what does the sheep want to see?"

"He said he wanted to be called Paul," said Wren almost sounding irritated, mostly sounding rescinded.  She must have seen that I was going to stick my foot in my mouth because of my irritation, because she cut me off. "He wants to see if you can get pictures of some of the creatures that exist now.  He's heard they're pretty exotic, and he likes to draw in his free time."

I glanced to where Paul was again.  He took out a sketchpad and held it out to me.  I took it, not sure what I would find.  Drawing, painting, sketching it wasn't usually thought as something girls did or boys did.  It depending on what was being done on the painting, what it looked like and so forth.  Some was very "girly" some was very neutral, and some was definitely done by an adolescent boy.

"Interesting," I said, passing the sketchpad back.  "Would you like me to do a general search or to look at my own collected slide show?"

"You have a slide show?" asked Paul, looking like he wanted to push me to the side to see them. I smiled and brought up the file, hitting the button and a big picture of a what had to have ancestors of wolves, but much bigger, with spines on his back, ear spread wide in ridges, and a molten green and red look to its fur.

"Wow, why haven't we been able to see those before?" said Paul, walking forward.  He paused, not even touching my chair, but pleading with his eyes.  I suppressed a sigh as I got out of the chair, sent him a quick smile, and went to go get ready.

"Aren't you afraid to leave him alone with your stuff?" asked Wren, following me.  I shed my clothes quickly and went to get a shower.  I got to work at the Den in an hour, which meant I needed to get freshened and into proper clothing.

"No, I locked everything off, and if my computer goes missing, than I'm blaming him and Stephanie can do whatever she wants," I said.  I glanced over at Wren as she just watched him clean.

"You're a lot more relaxed than you used to be," said Wren. "I mean, the thought of Stephanie used to paralyze you didn't it?"

"I think they're slipping something into my morning tea," I said. "Or that time I have to spend doing meditation is starting to affect me."

"I could talk to Mye," offered Wren, skipping a few steps ahead of me as she talked. "I know your friends with Georgia, but Mye helps make the morning food."

"That's alright," I said with a big yawn. "So, how does an engineer end up with this job?"

Wren smiled widely at me and I just raised an eyebrow.  Unfortunately, unlike Lisa and Tiger Lily, she didn't get huffy, she actually seemed like they were going to answer. 

"I don't have the credentials," said Wren with a shrug.  I looked at her in shock. "When I took the test and was put into diplomacy, like some girl from dirt corridor was actually going to be chosen for a comfortable government job.  My dad needed help keeping our place anyway, so I helped dad at the shop.  Thought I'd just get the work experience, get less money for my work, but then they passed that law."

Now there was a fake smile if I had ever seen one.  I gave him a slap on the back.

"Now I needed a certificate that said I'd at least gotten fifteen credits in engineering before I could get money for working in the shop," she said, and there was a touch of anger to her voice.  I turned, silently asking for her to help lace me up.  I didn't really need the help, but Wren looked like she needed her hands to be doing something. "So here I am, getting money for dad and for my lessons since the government won't help me get lessons in an area I didn't test into."

"Nice to know someone hates the tests as much as I do," I said with a what I hoped was a sincere looking smile.  Wren led me to her desk so I could have some place to put on my makeup. "So how much longer until you've saved enough?"

"Well, I've started taking classes last semester, and then took this one off," said Wren. "My dad broke his leg, and paying for classes when I get hit with the this is not your area you were tested into and you already gave up your right.  Though I swear, this next gal apparently actually has done some engineering so she won't be as useless as the last guy I had as a teacher.  His tests were impossible because he either gave us the wrong information and believed it or covered things you might only see once in your lifetime.  If the government only wants complete incompetents making shit for them, then they've developed the right system for it.  That or we just get the complete crap classes."

I wanted to tell her that she probably got the same teacher as everyone else, but that wouldn't necessarily mean anything.  What was the best way of going about this?  Probably just grunt and agree, so that what I did. 

Then I was headed down to the Den.  The heels were amazingly uncomfortable.  I had no idea why we couldn't just use an elevator or something, but that would have probably cost too much. 

At the end, I came upstairs, sticky and disgusting, wishing that I only got the nice and charming people to sit with me and not the seriously creepy and gross.  Really, sex could be a wonderful thing, even with people who didn't have "perfect" bodies.  Well, alright, sex could be a wonderful thing for the person I was with.  But when they were jealous of the way I looked, the way I moved, and the only way they seemed to be able to get off was by insulting me in every way they possibly could. 

So I was angry and pissed, and I felt like everyone was giving me a wide berth as we went up the stairs with my heels in hands. Not that there were a lot of us getting off at the same time, but a couple of people were bumping their way up at various levels of energy.  A couple of people looked like they were going to fall asleep on their feet, but I felt like I'd been drinking energy drinks. 

Best option was that I now go and let myself fall asleep in the bath water. 

I headed past my desk first to get my computer.  The thing sat on my desk, closed, with a paper on it.  I picked up the picture, there was a note on the back of it.

I heard you liked dragons.

I smiled.  Now that wasn't strictly true, but they were rather amazing.  I flipped to see the picture.  It was a little hard to see in the dimmed light and done all in charcoal, but the creature was amazingly fierce. 

Work fell into a pattern again.  Now I had hardly any time to myself.  Sometimes the best I could do was sit down with Paul and pretend I was fascinated by what he was drawing in those moments I had a time to catch my breath.  Of course even then there was the threat of Amy insisting on groping me, or Lisa wanting to chat, or Wren wanting to babble about how we could work together to take over the world.  Even Tiger Lily would intrude on these almost moments of almost peace and seclusions. 

I felt like I was running myself ragged and that there was an army of ants swarming inside my skin.  Amy watched my arms once when we had a second of cool down after a show at the Den, I stopped itching.  It was a phantom itch anyway, a trick my mind was playing as I got more and more crowded.  But if I broke the skin or started acting erratic I would probably be spending time with Cat again.

And the people from the other Home were here.  Their Home was called The Glass House.  And the women and men who came said they preferred to be courtesans and mistresses, and whenever I saw them or heard them talking, I got a feeling that they thought this distinction of words meant that they were better than us. 

I was just glad they had their own rooms to stay in.  Though it did make me wonder why we hadn't been put in the same section as the other Homes whore at the two places that we went.  Most of the interest directed at them from our end was in how they looked.  They were all incredibly pale.  Like they were as pale as me, but they had the right bone structure for it.  Not that I looked bad, but when you looked at people from the past with my color skin, there was just this difference of physical makeup that was different from people of different skin tones.

I did, however, get to keep one of their pads.  I didn't get to play with it until they were gone, and I wasn't supposed to know about it until they were gone, but Wren could not keep a secret to save her life and whispered it in my hear after observation classes one day, practically jumping up in happiness and clapping her hands together like a child as she did.  If nothing else, Wren can be fun to watch.

"I don't get it," said one the men.  He was sitting with Paul as Paul worked on his pictures.  For now, until they were gone, Paul was only going to be able to do so while I was there to keep an eye out.  There was probably a hacker and a thief in their group too.  No need to make things easy for them.

I had no idea why this courtesan had decided to join Paul as he worked.  Today Paul was dressed as a butler.  Well, I say he was dressed as a butler, but I doubt any butler worth anything but before the homes would have worn as little as he did.  It was a bit like Paul's maid uniform in that way.  There was just enough clothe and style there that you knew what kink he was trying to play to. 

"Why would you want to be with so many people when you could fill your pockets by just being with one?" the man finished his question.  His name was Bird according to his tag.  I decided that this must be the first time that Bird had seen Paul.  Paul, after all, was called Twins.  He liked to dress up like both sexes, and he liked being with two sexes.

"If I wanted that, then I would get married," said Paul, never looking at Bird.  He didn't look irritated, but it didn't look like he was listening very well to the man either.  Not that it seemed to matter to Bird.

"Can't drop them if you're married to them and their money runs out," said Bird with a really annoyingly patronizing smile.  I immediately wanted to point out that whoever was footing and paying for his expensive clothing and hair gel wouldn't be able to drop him as soon as he lost his good looks either.  But I just checked the clock that was slowly counting down the time and wishing Paul would say something to get rid of the annoying man. "What about you dear?  Why don't you settle down with a nice gal or lass?"

It took me a moment to realize he was talking to me. 

"Too much work," I said after staring at him.  He looked at me in shock and then threw his head back and laughed.  I wanted to rip the six inch heels off Paul's feet and shove them into Birds throat. 

"Dear, you were doing it wrong if it felt like work," said Bird.  I ignored it.  This whole thing was ridiculous.  I searched around until I found one of my pads and started hitting buttons. 

"Alright Twins, pack it up, we're going to the gym," I jumped a little, looking up at where Lisa was closing the top of my laptop. "You too Snow White."

I nodded and took over from Paul, unplugging everything and slipping my laptop away so I could go drop it off.

"You guys have a gym?" asked Bird, Lisa looked over at him, a small frown down turning her mouth. "You going too Amazon?"

"Snow White," snapped Lisa, she paused and her eyes went to his nametag. "Bird."

"Oh, this little one has a little bit of bite," said the man with a toss of his hair and a touch of a lisp.  I looked at him trying to figure out what he was trying to do.  He couldn't have been trying to endear himself to Lisa by acting obnoxious.

"Fine," said Lisa to my amazement.  I threw my bag over one shoulder, trying to figure out why she had caved.  It was clear that she just wanted Bird to go back with the rest of them.  I looked between the two, and then a thought that had already occurred to me made me want to smack my head against the wall.  Of course, he was like us.  Like us, he had a second skill set.

I didn't try to guess what it was yet, but it couldn't be hacking or computer could it?  He wasn't following us to see where I dropped off my computers could he?  I tried to will Lisa to look behind her and see the question in my eyes, but not even Paul seemed to realize that I had questions. 

So Lisa led us to my room where I threw my bag where I usually did and we changed into clothing that was better for working out in. 

"So miss Amazon," said Bird with a small smile.  I jumped a little since he seemed to have appeared out of nowhere on my bed. "How did you end up with the name Snow White?"

"They don't like it when I'm called Amazon," I said instead, grabbing some of my gloves and a hat.

"Why not?  I haven't seen another girl as built and big as you here," he said, looking him up and down.  I sent him an irritated glare. "Hey, I'm not judging, I can definitely see the appeal of having a fantasy of a strong woman."

"That's not what I do," I said, checking to make sure that all my electronics were stored and safe.  Hopefully someone would be in here, or monitoring the cameras in here, all day.

"Really," Bird said from only a little ways from my back.  I spun around and glared, muscles tight. "Still, this whole Snow White thing confuses me.  Sure, you have the color, but I never saw her as being so tall and built."

Yeah, he had made that clear. "I always thought so.  Well, not the tall thing since apparently dwarves are very small.  But after cleaning up and working all her life and then working for and looking after a bunch of rough men, I always thought she had to be strong."

I tried to sound strong, but I felt cornered.  The back of my legs hit my bed and I glanced behind me.  When I looked back at Bird he was right in my face.

"Back off," I snapped.  Bird only laughed.

"Oh come on dear," he said, running his hands along the side of my cheek. "My mistress doesn't mind with I have a little bit of fun."

"Back off, Birdie," said Paul, coping the high voice and lisp Bird had used before.  Lisa was the one to actually me away. "You don't want to mess with this girl."

"Right," he said with a roll of his eyes.

"Snow's a girl's girl," said Lisa. "You're right about people going to her because they want to feel safe.  But they don't go for her for mental stability.  You see the way she wound up like a spring.  That's not because she's willing to play helpless damsel with you.  That's her warning that if you don't back up she's going to take her laptop and crack it over your head."

By this time, Lisa had steered Bird away from me and backed him up toward the door a ways.  I took a deep breath and shook myself out.  Hopefully the man would leave now.  He certainly looked scared enough.

"Now come on you guys," said Lisa, her voice losing that condescending creepiness to it.  "Let's go work out.  Bird, you'll be spotting Twins."

Turned out that Bird didn't really work out that much.  Oh, he knew his way around alright and all the things to keep in mind about safety, but like Twins he probably only ever went into gyms to keep in shape.  Not my sort of shape, more the lightly toned, can have a few muscles to show off to the client sort of shape.

I watched as they worked with half an eye and so did Lisa.  Hell, I was pretty sure that everyone who was working out in the gym at this time were keeping their eyes on the pair.  Oddly enough, the only one who didn't seem to be paying Bird much mind was Paul. 

"You think it was a good idea to tell him about me?" I asked after a little while.  Lisa hummed a little and shrugged.

"It's better to tell him outright than you cause a house problem by hurting one of our guests," Lisa pointed out. "Plus, he knows that unlike where he comes from, prostitution and trading sex for money and comforts isn't actually socially acceptable here.  It would be expected that a lot of the girls be a little more unstable then the rest of the population, and for a small percentage of those to have issues surrounding sex that we use to our advantage.  Anyway, it's better just to throw Information Gathers a bone.  Otherwise they'll just keep digging and digging until they get themselves into real trouble."

The workout was stressful.  Not that we pushed ourselves that hard.  All eyes were on Bird.  I worked the floor again, and after that little dance, I didn't see Bird again, and didn't really talk to any of our visitors. 

They milled around, and some even talked to a few people.  I was dragged in to see Rose who grilled me on what had gone and what was said until I completely collapsed in on myself in paranoia.  Rose then cursed and called Amy who took me away.  Then they were gone.  I wanted to jump up and down in joy.  A little bit of stress was gone and I didn't have to talk the talk.

So I looked through all my stuff, finding nothing out of place and made sure to look through everything I could.  I even hacked into our network.  Now it was second nature to me, the door was wide open and I just strolled in and found all the information that I could.  There was the fingerprints of at least one hacker I knew all over the files. 

I unfortunately had a handle, or whatever, an avatar, a name, a brand, now.  That was something that Stephanie at least claimed the government wanted.  I did not.  They wanted me to throw myself at the wolves while also be in the shadows.  It sounded completely deranged.  So now I had a hacker name and the starts of a real reputation.  Not much at the moment, but I did get the feeling that I was supposed to let the hackers know I knew they had been there. 

The only good thing, I felt, was that I was not the only one who had a computer, and Paul had been supplied one to borrow after the thing with Bird.  So I was not the only one who could be the hacker.  That was if their house assumed the same thing as New Home, that we had a double skill set.  Hopefully the worse they thought was that we also acted as guards.  After all, a little weird for prostitutes to have their own completely tricked out gym. 

Still, I supposed having a "voice" as it was in the hacker community made some sense in some messed up way.  Well, Amy said that it showed that we did have one.  A sort of "oh, you have a hacker.  Interesting, so do we." in other words, an insanely stupid way to keep the peace.  An understanding that if ever voiced would lead to arguments and perhaps worse, but something that when unsaid created more stability and more even ground beneath us. 

I argued that the government had to have its own hackers that were actually trained computer geeks.  Amy and Lisa agreed on this, but pointed out that those people would hardly even go on a diplomatic mission unless it was absolutely necessary as not enough officials were allowed to bring in people who weren't completely dedicated to the job.  They had tried calling them secretaries and saying they needed them to keep them organized and work out the small details, but almost no homes went for that. 

No, but most would go for an equal amount of prostitutes coming in, especially if they got to sample the goods.  Alright, saying it like that sounded silly, but that was the truth.  I wondered who had come up with the idea to make actual prostitutes be the ones who had a "second skill set" instead of hiring specific people into the fields they wants who didn't mind putting on some makeup and acting a little "slutty". 

Though, from what I'd been hearing.  They didn't really take those of us who were guards seriously.  Always worrying about what was going to happen and that a bunch of women couldn't really do anything but cause a slight distraction.  But that's what I got for looking into our most important officials emails. 

"Stop worrying Jen," said Tiger Lily with a hard sigh.

"No," I said, looking hard at where Amy was sprawled on the bed.  The disinfectant and white wash feeling to the room might be nostalgic, but it did make my entire body shiver in fear.

"She's fine," Tiger Lily said, sitting cross legged in her seat, once again looking down on their seats.

"No, she's really not," I said.  I reached forward and put a hand on Amy's flushed skin, but she didn't make any movements.

"It's the drug," said Tiger Lily, still very bored. "He didn't want to kill her, just didn't ask before he injected something into her."

"And that's supposed to make me feel better?" I asked, practically snarling.

"His name is Ralph Hoodins," said Tiger Lily.  I looked up at her in confusion.

"You want me to track him down?" I asked slowly.  As mad as I was, I don't think I would dare do that.  I was more the immediately react to what happens sort of girl, not the can do anything long after the fact type. "I thought Mica already beat him more stupid."

"He did," said Tiger Lily with a nod of her head. "But you have other way to make him pay."

I looked at her in incomprehension, long enough that Tiger Lily just looked irritate beyond belief over what had happened.  And then I got it.  I started by getting out my pad.  This was going to be fun. 

"Tiger Lily..." came a soft voice as I was working.

"It makes her feel better," said Tiger Lily.  Lisa sighed and waved a hand in front of my work.

"Yeah, and what if someone puts two and two together.  They see that Amy has been incapacitated and the idiot who did it is now claiming that his bank account and everything stored about him is wrong," snapped Lisa.  I paused in my work even as Tiger Lily snorted.

"The thing today wasn't exactly kept well under wraps," said Tiger Lily.

"Exactly," said Lisa. "They're going to know about it."

"Do you know how many people claim to love Amy?" asked Tiger Lily, finally looking up from her work. "Enough government officials, especially the young and stupid who call her up at the end of the day, are going to be suspects that Snow White here will be the furthest suspect.  Why have you stopped?"

The last question was directed at me.  I looked over at her with an eyebrow raised. "I'll let Amy decide."

"Aren't you angry?" asked Tiger Lily, actually looking genuinely annoyed at me. "Don't you want to do something."

"Yes, but it wouldn't be for her," I said slowly, "and I think I would just fret about it later.  So if Amy wants it done, it will be."

"Plus, that was a grade A idiot," said Lisa. "I mean, he tried to say he was going to sue us and it took him until Mica actually paused in his beating to realize how stupid that was.  Then he said he would turn us in.  Like the government couldn't stop us if they wanted to.  If he has half a mind and a greater amount of idiocy, then he'll try to force their hands by making us public.  I think the government would rather make a deadweight citizen disappear than lose Stephanie as a resource."

Tiger Lily didn't look happy, and I didn't think it was enough either.  I guess it was just how I was raised.  I was glad that he got to be beaten up, normally the person who did that would be in trouble too, but I just felt angry that he could never be punished in the name of the law for what he did to Amy. 

"Snow White, I need you," said a voice from the doors.

"Hello to you too, Rose," said Lisa.  Rose glanced at them.  I turned and had already started to put everything away.

I quickly ran to get to her. What could I possibly be of any use for.  Of course Rose didn't give any answers, not that I asked anything. We went down, down, down, almost to the Den.  Rose sat me in front of a monitor and then just started to talk to me.  She started to overwhelm me.  I mean, she just started talking.  I ended up taking out a computer, not that she noticed.  I mean, she was looking right at me, but not seeing me, if you know what I mean.  When I got my computer, she just kept talking and talking.

It wasn't even that she was talking about nothing or that she was talking about a lot of deep stuff. Her and Amy were close in their own way.  Like they talked and talked and talked.  Her words started to blend together into nothing.  Which was good, because this sounded like a lot of sensitive information.  It piled up about everything that was going on.  And none of it appeared to be working out.  She complained about the prostitutes.  Who was trouble, who needed to get watched.  Who could be a possible plant.  Wow it was a really good thing that I could shut my mouth and they weren't actually paying any attention to me.  Because all I could think about was how could anyone possibly be a plant from another home?

However, my fingers just kept going, even as she started complaining about officials and the laws and the unwritten laws.  It all made my head spin. 

"And that should be it," said Rose, slapping her legs.  She looked down at what I was doing and my computer whirled under my fingers.  She took a deep sigh and nodded to my work. "I want a copy of that and then destroy it.  Here, I have a drive."

She reached for her bracelet, and after playing around with it for a few moments, popped out a thin metal storage device.  She looked at it for a moment, before she handed it to me.  I took it and quickly downloaded everything I had written onto it.  Gave the storage device back and went about destroying any evidence of what I had just written. 

It didn't take very long.

"You can go now," said Rose dismissively, waving her hand at me.  I nodded and started to stand.  Still, I guess curiosity just won out.

"Why?" I asked.  Rose just looked up at me with vague confusion creasing her brow.  I huffed out a sigh. "Why did you talk to me?"

"This is about the time I unload all I've learned with Amy.  We compare notes, talk things through, and start to work on patches and new projects that we can at the time while putting others on the back burner," said Rose.  She stood and dusted off imaginary wrinkles in her clothing. "I choose to talk to you because for some reason Amy trusts you, and while I don't always trust her judgment, I've seen you together enough to trust that you are loyal to her if no one else."

She gestured through the door, and I nodded in understanding, spinning on my heels I went to leave the room.  Partly my hasty retreat was in shame, or guilt, or something to that ilk.  After all, I hadn't exactly ever thought of myself as loyal, not to any idea or anyone.  I had had friends before.  Alright, perhaps not as close as the ones I had now.  But I knew my own way of thinking and living.  I didn't connect with people once they were out of my life.  Once I didn't have an excuse like classes or work or my parents keep making me play with you, well, I just didn't keep in contact. 

That was why nothing ever went right, or at least, that's what I assumed.  Or well, not that it didn't go right.  That's why I didn't get attached, because I was bad at staying attached.  People might be interested in still hanging out with me after the fact, and I might think of them once in a while.  But I would make no effort to keep in contact.  That was just the way I was. 

"Hey, Amy is awake!" said Lisa, coming out of nowhere and dragging me away.


	9. Blue Buttons

I was reading again.  Ever since I had started reading my own stuff, I had been paranoid someone would notice that the stuff I choose was different in fundamental way than before. But no one was writing anything about an increase of quality or words, or a change in subject.  The last few pieces had been about the people I worked with.  It had started with Amy and then just gone on from there. 

Not that if anyone who knew me or Amy they would know that is was her I was writing about.  It wasn't even that long, and I swore it was less coherent than normal.  Actually, it reminded me of when I started writing poetry.  The kind of poetry I still wrote.  I only wrote poetry when I didn't care at all what other people thought, because the kind of poetry I wrote was trash.  It was complete and utter nonsense to everyone who read it but me.  Connected words and images that created and sustained memory and thought and vivid moments for me, but not for anyone else.  It was tripe and juvenile to everyone else.

Still, I kept writing, and they kept debating and criticizing and acting like what I wrote actually had any sort of meaning.  Which, no, especially since while they picked up that it was often about people and emotions and trying to figure out how the world worked, it still didn't make any sort of sense at all. 

Beyond that they seemed to think I had something deep to say instead of just pointing out things.  There was even some groups that thought I was making reference to the outside world.  Talking about either going outside, or using the animals to our advantage instead of just guarding ourselves against them. 

"Why are staring at the screen like that?" asked Amy, looking over my shoulder.  I covered my computer so no one could see what I was doing. "You shouldn't act like that.  It just makes you look guilty."

"I am a computer nerd," I said, turning so Amy couldn't see me and putting my computer on my lap.  Amy pouted at me, and I just raised an eyebrow as I picked the piece I would put for the week. "My life is seeped in the dark and the disgusting."

"Now all you need is to be fat and covered in chip dust," said Amy, snapping my computer shut.  I let her and started putting things away.

"So, where is this next place we are going?" I asked turning and throwing my satchel over one arm. "I heard the drive there was going to be murder."

"Sounds about right.  We get some actual soldiers to go with us, and the trip is five days," said Amy.

"We get soldiers?" I asked in surprise.  Amy nodded.

"They won't be allowed in the home, they're just there to protect from any animals that might actually have a chance of causing damage to our car," said Amy.  She had her own phone out and was hitting buttons. "This is sort of one of our two big trips for this year.  A lot of people are going on this.  A weird amount from us.  Well, no, we are going to Rose Petal.  Have you hacked into Rose Petal yet?"

I shook my head and settled down while folding my legs under me.  I took out my computer again as Amy sat next to me.  There were already a few people who I knew from passing.  These were the "diplomats" of our group.  They were all prostitutes, they were all quirky, and they all tried to have more than a second skill in diplomacy.  After all, we had enough going on. 

"What's wrong with Rose Petal?" I asked.

"It's completely insane," said Amy with a sigh and a shake of her head.  It used to be completely beyond wonder. "They used to be really conservative, but well, apparently what our ancestors always feared would happen if we kept outdated, not harmful social convention from taking place, well happened.  The place basically collapsed in on itself and went black for a while.  It only got back in contact with us ten years ago, and it looks like the rebels won."

"Rose Petal makes us look tame," said one of the diplomats who was currently dressed like a playboy bunny. "Not us as in our home, but us as prostitutes."

"We're not even sure how they stay together," said the only guy I had ever seen come to these movies.  He was wearing all this leather gear but had a tie and fisticuffs on. "It isn't just the sex.  They have drugs and weapons and no inhibitions.  They should have destroyed themselves by now."

"But instead they just seem to be growing," said Rose. "Five minutes until the meeting starts.  Amy, have you seen Tiger Lily?"

"Nope, but she sent a message about ten minutes ago, so she should be here soon," said Amy while leaning against me.  Rose just hummed speculatively and started going through her notes the rest of the diplomats, and observers, came and crowded around us, ready to gossip.

"I can't believe you get to go on another trip," said the bunny girl, pouting at Amy. "I specialize in fighting too."

"You should have volunteered to be our new hackers guide," said Amy with a teasing grin. "That's why I'm currently getting to stretch my wings."

"Yeah, I think I'll pass," said the bunny, giving me a dubious look.  I freed my hand enough to flip her off and then snuggle myself so I was cocooning Amy in my arms. "No offense."

"Yeah, that doesn't really help," Amy said.

"But really, even though this is a big trip, how did Stephanie swing it so that more than half of our group is going?" someone else asked.

"Well, the soldiers need to have some fun too.  And Rose Petal is a stupidly far away," another person with a helium voice said.

The conversation continued to bump around for a while.  Like it just wasn't that important. 

Finally the meeting started.  I was there with the observers that would be going on this trip.  There were a lot of us.  More than one hundred were going on the trip. With Two hundred and eighteen prostitutes in our group and just over half heading our way, we were royally screwed. 

I watched, this was my job at the moment.  Not that I would see anything that three other of my colleagues didn't.  But it was the thought that counted I supposed.

"And why isn't she here?" demanded one of the diplomats, a girl more of an Amazon than I was.  She flipped her hair and glared murder at Rose.  Rose stared at the person who interrupted.  It looked rather ridiculous.  The woman was dressed in this weird valkerie clothing.  Rose watched, sitting back in a red silk dress that wrapped around her with small beads put in her hair carefully.  They showed in the stands, catching light. "Where is Stephanie.  She needs to answer for what she has done?"

"And what has she done?" asked someone with a look that made her like some soft of ice crystal. 

"Why did she want all of us to go than?" asked the Valkerie.  There was a shocked pause. The woman scoffed in disgust as if she had just won. "You think you actually can have any privacy here Amy?  I heard you and your little pet hacker talking.  The first time Stephanie sent the request, she asked all of us to go with them.  Not even with fifty soldiers does and a freaky Home could Stephanie think that was a good idea without some hidden agenda.  We have a right to know what that was."

"I don't know," said Rose, sending an irritated look Amy's way.

"And Stephanie didn't write it down," said Amy. "So don't ask either of us."

"And you aren't interested either?" asked the irate woman. 

"Of course I am," said Amy, leaning back.  "But Stephanie isn't really talking to me.  If you want answers, than make an appointment to see her yourself."

"And until then," said Rose in anger, cutting off the valkerie, "Let's actually talk about our plans.  This place is not to be taken lightly.  Last time we almost lost one of the officials, three of our girls, and our harmless status.  We need more control.  Two of those girls ate that food willingly."

"And one of those girls didn't know the food had narcotics in it," muttered someone only dressed in sequins.

"Which is why we are bringing our own this time," said someone else at the table. 

"But what about the smoke?  That didn't kill anyone, but it certainly made a few lips looser," piped in someone I couldn't see with a shrill voice.  The conversation went on like this.  I wondered if this home we were going to really was this dangerous, or if for the last two houses had been just as dangerous as this one was, I just didn't get to hear all the gory details. 

Thankfully I had the night off.  Actually I had the next three as everyone who was going on this trip scrambled to get ready.  There were a lot of meltdowns though, so I was afraid I would get asked to fill in.  People who were going were fretting about the danger of the journey and many without a second skill set were afraid of what it meant that they were going.  Some people with a second skill set were angry that they weren't going.  And a fight broke out near my table once that I was just able to avoid and keep all my computers away from. 

I spent most of my time trying to hack into this place.  It sounded like a cesspool, and though I knew I was being silly, I was half afraid that I had got a virus.  Their websites were gross was a word I wanted to use.  I mean, it wasn't like they thought about sex anymore than us, but we had limitations.  I mean, prostitution was considered illegal, and people weren't supposed to have more than one significant other, and you weren't supposed to have sex until you were ready to take the next step and were seriously considering getting married. 

Lisa looked over my shoulder as I went onto those sites.  I really should try to find a back door in.  But what I was finding was amazing.  Well, no, amazing wasn't the right word.

"What the hell sort of shit are you looking up?" asked Spider.  I jumped and looked at the woman.  She was glaring at me and Wren hit her shoulder.

"Be nice, she has to look that up," scolded Wren.

"She had to look up a horse fucking a..."

"Do you want something Violet, or did Wren just bring you here to scare Jen?" asked Lisa in irritation.

"Actually, we were hoping you had seen Paul," said Wren, wringing her hands together. "It's been a while since he went anywhere, and he keeps avoiding my questions.  So I thought Spider could talk to him.  Sometimes she's better at than me."

I looked over at Spider, yeah, I could see how that worked.

"Right now he's with Yole, but you're set to entertain him next, right Jen?" said Lisa, looking at me for confirmation.  Wren gasped as I nodded my head.

"Yeah, but I don't think that's the best time to big him about getting his stuff together since he really likes drawing..."

"Wait, Paul had a breakdown?" asked Wren, hands clutching in front of her.  Lisa just sighed and nodded.

"He woke up last night in a fit, only calmed down after Jen clocked him," said Lisa.  Wren looked at me in shook while Spider had the same look she had when she yelled at me this morning.

"I told you there's no way I did that," I said, glancing at the clock and counting down the seconds.  It was weird how things could be going too slow and too fast all at the same time. "I don't remember a thing like that."

"How are you Paul's friend?" asked Spider.  I just shrugged my shoulders. 

"He's not really, but he uses my computer for his pictures," I said and laughed. "So you can just stop worrying about it Spider.  We won't even be talking together."

The days rolled by and then we were getting into our outfits.  This time there was no special costumes that made all a group of the same freaks.  Now we wore our own personal prostitution shit.  These people had to be weird, or we had so many people I would have days to myself, because the only thing I got from Stephanie told me to bring my lounging clothes.  I didn't get to wear them much any longer.

Still, getting in was a pain.  I didn't have a government official to entertain, but we all had to fit into this tight spot and somehow I did end up next to one.  Thankfully I got a message quick to Amy to help me out when he started to get a little frisky.  I mean, alright, he was hardly going to remember one girl out of one hundred especially when I wasn't assigned to him, and he seemed a little tipsy.

Amy had fun with that, and I might have pinched her since now we smelled and were sticky.  There had to have been a better way to go about that.  By the time a couple of hours were up, I was tempted to take out my computer despite good common sense.  I tapped my leg in irritation.  It didn't help that I kept getting buffeted about. 

A blip went off on my phone, I reached into my jacket and took it out.

Kill all the government officials

I blinked at the words on the screen.  The message was from Stephanie, and I couldn't help but be surprised, and a little freaked out.

"Um, Amy..." I started to say, wanting to see if she could tell me what was going on. And then the government official's phone started to go off. He looked at it, and his hand started going into his jacket.

"Buttons Blue!" I shouted at the top of my voice.  I didn't know if there was something specific thing I was supposed to shout to let them know that government officials might have done something wrong and were about to murder this all.  This was the Den's way of saying that a client might be doing something like that. 

The room was suddenly filled with fear and screaming.  The car started to shake and turn.  The thing went wonky, and the lights flickered.  I turned to where Amy was sitting.  There were two flickering whips in her hands, and blood around the spot where the man was now slumped.  There was screaming, that was stopped suddenly by a sudden shot into the air.

"Listen up," said Rose, her voice echoing around. "It looks like something has gone wrong, and no matter what, we won't be going back home.  Calm the fuck down."

It was amazing how that screaming voice actually cut through the whimpers that were breaking from some people.  Great, after a week of breakdowns, now we got to al breakdown and die inside a crate. 

A shot went off and every eye went back to the stern look Rose with a gun pointing straight into the air. 

"Listen, you've all been trained.  You've known how tentative our dealings with the government was and that this was a weird assignment," Rose looked around. "Now we haven't got time for this shit.  Now all guards get ready to fight.  It we're lucky, some of those fuckers got killed by a dragon, while our engineers get the doors open and our hacker makes it seem like we're all dead and everything is fine so we can catch them off guard."

I swore and ran to my satchel.  With a huff of breath I opened up and turned on my computer, swearing at the slow start up time, I flipped open my phone to see something had been downloaded to me, well actually several files had been sent to my personal profile.  The computer was finally ready.  I quickly got done what I needed to, but after that, I wasn't done, not by a long shot. 

There was a grating squeal that had me, and everyone around, reaching for our ears.  The prostitutes screams broke through the entire room.  My body shook as gunfire and screams split the air.  Then the explosions went off.  The entire car shock from side to side and I know I screamed with the rest of them. 

I held the computer tight to my chest and tears fell from my eyes as I shook.  As a wave the rest of us left.  I had no idea if we were herded by our own, or by instinct, or by the soldiers that meant to kill us.  We were dead.  The government officials, even if we were a bunch of pathetic girls would have overwhelmed the twenty government officials. 

We were lost in the desert it seemed.  The contraption we had been driven in did have wheels, huge wheels that slipped over the sand, but from the smoke and wreckage, it was clear that it wasn't just lucky that we hadn't been killed by the explosion, but we aren't going anywhere.  Even if the engine isn't destroyed, one of the huge wheels are and we're not going anywhere without that thing. 

Another round of gunfire goes out, and there's a scream from the girls around.  Probably the guys to, but the girls are the ones that ring in my head long after their back to whimpering. 

Eventually, after it seems like nothing and no one is going to be telling me what is going on, I head back into the van and turn on my computer again.  I'm still able to connect, thank goodness, Wren made this or took it, but whatever it was, she assured me that in any Home my computer would connect to the internet.  Of course, this wasn't a home.  This was outside.  A very big, very open place that made several of the girls look lost and throw up upon seeing it.  It was also unseemingly hot, there was wind, but that just pushed the hot air and sand more desperately toward us and coated my throat so that I felt as it I would choke.

I was able to connect however.  I sent a quick message to the government.  It was the sort of, "of course I don't want to be beholden to a woman, but you just killed my main employer, not sure if I can trust you" sort of thing.  I also checked and destroyed any incoming information that even vaguely hinted that something went wrong.  Well, sort of, I did only alter some to make it look like the "expected" thing had happened.  All the undesirable government officials had been overwhelmed and killed, but that it had been easy to subdue and kill the surviving whores. 

Turned out that I really wanted to plant a bomb in their office and blow them up.  Well, maybe find a way to poison them all.  Really, were their egos so easily broken and bruised.  Because, at least from this initial findings, I realized that they seemed to have set out to kill Stephanie's entire operation, not because she was compromised, but because they didn't like that they were forced to rely on her. 

"How is it going?" asked Amy, coming to look around at the computer that was going to soon run out of batteries. "This situation is so weird.  Did you find a good reason why this happened?"

"Because they didn't like that a whore was the one who supported them," I said with a snap.

"They wrote that?" asked Amy looking incredulous.

"No, well, most of them didn't.  Most of it seemed to be about extortion from people who were breaking the law and that the only sure way to make sure that the government didn't lose all control and the home fall into despair was to get rid of the situation completely," I said, my throat sticking. "You don't think they'll do anything to my parents do you?"

"I don't know," said Amy with a scoff. "Sounds like they've gone around the bend.  I mean, they relied on Stephanie and us girls.  Without us the other homes are going to walk all over them."

"You able to do anything?" Amy asked.

"I made it seem like the soldiers won," I said with a shrug. "But they're going to know something is wrong when the soldiers don't return by tomorrow. And then they'll know I'm compromised too."

"You told them about yourself?" asked Lisa, coming to stand next to me with blood dripping down onto her forehead.  She must have seen my rather started look because she just smiled widely at me. "Don't worry, I'm hardly nicked.  Some of the girls are much worse off than me."

"I had to, but I've been building the idea that I'm a guy in their heads for so long than even if their hackers can follow my computers IP address or whatever like Amy told me to do," I said, letting my body slump a little against the air.

"Well, how about trying to get us some help?" asked Amy.  I looked at her as if she'd gone insane. "We can't survive out here by ourselves.  It's too far a walk to the next home and our car's been destroyed.  So we need outside help.  Tell HSH what happened and that we're stranded."

"I'm kinda sure that they hate us," I said slowly.

"Yeah, New Home would probably be better.  At least they think we're entertaining," said Lisa. "Even Jen knows that HSH is dead set against us.  I mean, they're so far up their own asses I don't think they even realize that we are anything more than prostitutes."

"They don't.  They think at most we might be there to gather information by convincing them to sleep with them.  One condescending ruling family thinks that if we tried it would be rather hysterical," I said, the others gave me a look.  I shrugged. "I paid more attention to what was happening in the correspondences of other Homes than our own.  I'm an idiot."

"Should have been born in the basement," said Lisa with a shrug.

"Or in the attic," said Amy.  "But sometimes it's impossible to rise or sink below the floor you were born on."

I pushed her with my shoulders, sent my email or plead, or whatever out, somehow also figuring out where we were in the meantime, and then my computer died.

"Well, there we have it.  Since the car is completely useless, I've run out of juice and it's in her hands now," I said with a rough sigh.  I looked up at Amy. "I hope you made the right call."

"You could have used your own judgment," Amy pointed out with those infuriating smiles. I just glared at her.

"And how am I supposed to make that call when I know nothing?" I demanded.  Amy just shrugged and looked out.  I wanted to yell, do something, nerves were rolling up my arms.  But I've now learned to be at least open to what was going on,  I really wanted to destroy something.

"Is that healthy?" I asked softly, but of course Lisa heard me.

"Of course not if it's you," said Lisa, bumping my shoulder.  I almost got angry.  Not for any reason, just because I felt insulted and needed to react to something, anything. But I had been trained to observe, and every once in a while that meant something.  For the most part, I saw and acknowledged what I always had while filing away the small specific details until they’re to be drawn out by either writing up my report or if I'm specifically asked.  That doesn't mean I don't actually pay attention to all I'm seeing and put together what it means on the spot if I have to.

Lisa was playing with one her knives.  Flipping it over and over in her hand, eyes glancing over everything she sees.  By her side was a gun, a small gun, the kind the soldiers keep handy just in case they lose everything else, but she had it out and her other hand wasn’t far from it.  Amy had her whips in easy access and very visible.  They weren’t glowing with deadly power, but they did let out a light buzzing noise that snapped every once in a while that made me think they could be deadly in seconds. 

I'm not the only one wound tight right now.  Everyone is in the same boat.  And I'm not even that bad off.  Unlike most I know that we're alright because Lisa is back with me.  We won, subdued the soldiers.  The shots that echo from time to time and have the rest of the prostitutes shaking and letting loose little screams of fear, were probably the guards interrogating the soldiers left and killing those they choose or wounding the in order to get information.

I wondered if the soldiers knew anything more than I had already found out on my computer.  But I supposed that Rose had to try every avenue to saving us.

"Hey, come on, let's get inside," said Amy, her hands wrapping around my own.  I looked up at her. "Your shaking.  Best to get you inside to get things done."

"No," I said, taking out one of my pads and trying to see if one of them would connect. "I need to see what I can find out."

"They'll come or they won't," said Lisa, holding my other side. "We need to get everyone in and out of trouble."

"Then why did we leave?" I demanded angrily, trying to break their hold.  Amy sighed and looked around, but Lisa just glared, ready to drag me back if she had to. I shook my head.  I have to stay out here, I'm more likely to get what I can and I need to get connection."

"You won't... let's go inside.  Maybe the car still has juice and you can start charging it and looking at HSH and figuring how best to keep us alive," said Amy, pulling gently on my arm.  I glared at her, wondering if she really thought I was supposed to be so stupid.

"How could I be so stupid," I practically screamed.  Suddenly I felt myself practically lifted off the floor.  I fought, but I wasn't trained to fight.  I knew self defense, but I was taught by Amy who obviously hadn't done more.  I let myself be propped against a wall somewhere, and curled into a ball, hands on my head.

"You going to be alright Jen?" asked Amy softly her hand on my back.  I flipped over.

"I should have known," I said, distress dripping pathetically from my lips.  Amy and Lisa shared a look. "I should have been spending more time looking through our own government's emails and files and intel.  Why didn't I?  I mean, I kept saying I was busy but I knew the government didn't like us.  I should have been... I don't understand.  I've always looked through their stuff, not much, just looking to make sure they aren't aware of me, but this last year I stopped doing even that."

"Calm down Jen.  You can't except yourself to see something that only Stephanie saw and then deigned not to tell any of us about," said Lisa, carding her fingers through my hair, undoing the small braids I'd put in sporadically. 

"But that was my job.  To keep everyone informed.  To have information on what they know and when things have gone wrong," I said, I bent my body back and my head was caught by the gentle grip of Lisa who was stopping me from hurting myself.  I tried to go to my hair, but Lisa twisted my fingers in hers to stop me from pulling my hair. 

"Stephanie didn't ask you to look into them," Amy pointed out.  "She asked for reports on other Homes, as much as you could get.  That's what you did.   If you spent time looking into our own Home than you wouldn't have been doing your job."

"No, instead I spent my free time letting Paul draw pictures," I said, face twisted and fighting against Lisa's hold. "You don't understand.  I've always been paranoid.  I've always over thought things, especially when I thought they might be dangerous.  Any hint of it, and I was at my best and checking like mad to make sure that I wasn't being followed or hounded because I'd see shadows everywhere after the smallest infraction or hint that I had upset someone or some system.  So how is that when I get a job that is technically illegal do I become so lax when it comes to covering my ass?"

"Calm down," demanded Lisa, shaking me a little and looking more irritated than anything at my outburst.  She looked out and I realized that she probably was needed in either interrogating the soldiers or helping get all the prostitutes back into the car while we waited for HSH to come.  I was such a burden, and unfortunately, because I hate when my mind does this to me, is that I could only think that they were there an making sure that I didn't hurt myself was because they need me as the hacker to see them through if HSH actually took us in. "Please Jen, we need to find our friends."

"I'm sorry I'm so fucking useless," I snapped, tears gathering in my eyes.  Have you ever been in the situation where you realize that how your reacting is not helpful and you needed to calm down because you were being worst than useless, but the knowledge of that is what makes it harder to calm down until your practically hyperventilating.  Yeah, that was happening to me.

"Please," said Amy. "This isn't your fault.  We need you Jen.  We can't have you falling apart."

"I should have known," I said.  I wanted to tell her that I did know.  That I needed to tell her that it was fine. "I should have been looking."

"We didn't ask you look," said Amy, now she sounded slightly annoyed as well as concerned.  I glanced at her and tried to talk but she pushed me down, pushing Lisa away as she straddled me.  I looked at her, my head titling to the side. "No, you don't get it.  We didn't ask and I didn't fuck with your head so you would."

I looked up at her in confusion.  Amy just sighed and leaned down and gave me a quick kiss on the lips. "Stay here.  We're going to get everyone inside.  If we're here tonight, we'll need to share body heat."

I nodded, because that had been one of the random and pointless this I had learned while looking around.  Amy forced her own smile, got off me, and left.  I looked over at Lisa, before curling up.  I was still shaking, but I didn't make any move to dig my fingers into my hair and skin so Lisa just watched me. Until finally saying and standing up.

"She never said she didn't fuck with your head," Lisa pointed out.  I just shook my head and curled myself.


	10. Taken Seriously

Eventually we had all been gathered back inside where for a while it seemed like some of the girls would strike out and overthrow Rose as our leader.  Rose was scary though, and she had the backing of all the guards.  No one even had to be hurt or more than yelled at. 

Lisa came time to time with friends.  And I mean friends in a loose sense.  I mean, sure there was Wren, Paul, and Spider, which fine.  There was also a friend of Georgia's, since Georgia wasn't there, and that guy that worked the Den, wore women's clothing while looking very male, and scowled at me, and a few people who I had gone into Home with.  This was just plain weird, when it came down to it.  Some asked questions, but Paul, Wren, and even Spider told them to get off my back.

It didn't matter.  Rose told them everything I had found out.  Either she took it from the soldier or Amy had told her.  I hadn't seen Amy since after she had apparently told me that she had fucked with my brain.  Really, I could have done with her.  I didn't know what she meant, and I didn't want to think about it.  I wanted her here as a distraction.  We could kiss and have sex, and while that wasn't necessarily interesting, the hyperawareness of everything would occupy my mind away from thinking about how I screwed up and how Amy might have helped there.

Wren was a wreck though, so that helped.  Probably wasn't for the best if I was being truthful.  I mean, what sort of friend relished when their friends were hurt because it eased them?  That made me a pretty horrible person.  But Wren was distressed.  They couldn't fix the car. Amy first had to be calmed down because she couldn't fix the car.

Apparently she saw it as a disadvantage.  Because she was supposed to be the competetant ones.  Yeah, there were other engineers and mechanics, she was the one who could actually do things, unlike everyone else.  It was rather pathetic when it came down to it.  How was she the best engineer?

I tried to calm her down.  Got her to talk it through.  Spider would help when I got stuck on what to say, her eyes watching me, pinning me and making my entire body shiver, not in fear, but just in how creepy the situation was.  HSH didn't show up before night, and I found out just how extreme the weather was.  We went from sweltering hot in our car, to cold as hell.  We all cuddled together.  All my equipment setup to the best that we could do and also have it in the warmth pile.  We didn't want it to get so cold that my computer stuff was useless, that would make me rather useless. 

Then everything went a little insane.  Lights shone bright into our car and a lot of girls screamed, and guys too probably.  Our group all curled in together.  Everyone trying to disappear into their groups, instinctively hoping that would save them. 

It turned out to be the people from HSH.  They got us together.  We acted almost like we should have.  We were supposed to be prostitutes that got lucky.  Really lucky when it came down to it.  According to Lisa only ten of us had been killed.  Two from the government officials, which was a complete and incomprehensible miracle, and then ten more when they fought the soldiers.  Once again, a miracle.  The guards had weapons, but only a few had guns, and those were modified to look like props and weren't as effective because of that.  The rest of them had weapons like Amy and Lisa.  Small things, or ones that looked like props and hopefully wouldn't look too dangerous.

Still, even as all of us tried to look like normal prostitutes, we ended up with some degree of not believable at all.  I had to be one of the less obvious, but even then I had all my computer stuff in bags held tight to my chest, and they did scans so I couldn't help but wonder that they thought I had with me.  Or what excuses or conclusions they were coming to when they saw the soldiers all dead and prostitutes holding the soldiers guns and their "play" weapons also kept close to their sides.  What did they think of people like Wren with oil in her hands and hair. 

I wanted to plug in, but first they divided us up and I could only hope that I would see my friends again.  I did get put with Tiger Lily.  She put her legs next to mine and we tried to give each other support without being obvious.  We didn't want to get separated.  Finally we all met together.  Rose id a roll call while I met with my friends.  Trying to ignore their friends as we all seemed to be tightly tied together. 

Rose had all the engineers and me go about making the little box of a room that we had privacy.  It turned out that they hadn't thought much of us.  I mean, besides that they could see Wren and others stuff and they hadn't taken what we needed to make this happen.  I didn't even have to do anything, well, not much, I did loop the cameras and set up my pad to alert me when it was time to change things up so they didn't start catching on.  Or well, hopefully didn't catch on. 

Of course, since Paul was with me, I didn't realize we lacked one important resource.  Men.  All the men prostitutes had been taken away.  All but Paul who was dressed like a aid.  And while Paul did have a very feminine look to him, if you looked at him for more than a second you would know that he was a guy.  Wren coned and stocked his head and said he was so lucky he was ever changing. 

Paul smiled at me, but I had no idea how to respond to this.  Paul's and almost all the prostitute’s obsession at dressing in some level like girls just didn't make sense to me.  Not that I cared, really, the only time I cared was when they demanded that I cared.  Though thankfully this didn't happen too often.

Amy came to me looking exhausted.  Before she did anything, without trying to do anything to me, she first just looked at me.  Stared me in the eyes and let me know she was seeing if she was welcome.  I stared at her for a while, not letting her know one way or the other.  Finally, I sighed, because Amy didn't look sexy or comfortable in her own body.  Not that she was ashamed of her nakedness, but that it didn't matter.  She always liked to flaunt, now she just was.

So I kissed her and leaned back.  We weren't the only ones "indulging" you could hear others finding comfort in one another's warmth.  Poor Lisa and other ones who derived no pleasure, or no real pleasure from being with a girl.  At least I got to get Amy back with me and I got a distraction of sorts.  Really, being friends with Amy had its advantages, or being the hacker did. 

After Amy was done with me, she curled over next to me and fell asleep, apparently completely dead to the world.  I took out my computer and started writing again.  The stuff I wanted to check out taking forever to get through and I ended up taking Tiger Lily up on her request and dictating important information to her so that she could write it down.  That way I didn't have anything to write.  I just immersed myself.

Once I was done, or at least I had to take at least a little break from what was going on, Amy was awake and leaned down to take me away.  I followed her, not sure where I was going. Tiger Lily followed, as always, writing on her pad again and again and again. 

"Alright, so what do we know?" asked Rose as we came to where she was sitting.  Some girl in a sweat stained green dress looked over at me and sighed.  Standing up and sending a dirty look Rose's way.  Rose watched her, looking cool and relaxed in her own dress, which I was pretty sure had been changed since that last time. 

Tiger Lily was the one who responded, kind of.  She explained first that she hadn't got it all sorted and properly put into groups for clarity, but even I knew that we didn't have time to be perfect.  Tiger Lily probably did also, but felt she had to say it.  She always had to say when she knew something wasn't perfect but was going along anyway.  Rose nodded and gave us both a time to see her again with more information. 

I must have looked devastated because Rose started to give me a speech about what our situation was.  I might have blown up at her and then stormed away.  People watched as I stormed away, and I was a little afraid that I might cause problems for Rose by acting like that.  Undermine her.  But I was at the end of my ropes, stressed and needed a break and yet couldn't get a break.  I wanted to hurt someone.  Of course the person I really wanted to hurt was dead, and the others were out of my reach.

We continued to research, and eventually I never was far from Rose, so that Tiger Lily was the one who talked to Rose while for a short time I talked at someone else who was "half of Tiger Lily" but despite this and all our anxiety, it was still fear that gripped all of us when Rose finally got some information and request to meet from our saviors from HSH.

"They want to meet.  Like how we usually do it," said Rose, and then held up her hand.  because some people had no idea what that would entail, and those who did know how it worked, were confused about how it worked. "We're all to go to the meeting.  Amy, Clincy, and I will be sitting in a chair while all of you are in the background.  If you have a special skill that will help, like observation and analysis, your to be at the front.  Otherwise, as long as no one says otherwise, you are to watch and look at our pads.  You should be able to connect, only have them on during the meeting, and during just the meeting look through what you can, no hacking, just explore.  Write up a quick report, send it to Tonsil."

"Why?" asked someone.  Rose just glared and most of the guards got to work getting us all sorted out.  Eventually we all found ourselves in the middle of a nightmare.  I mean, alright, so it turned out to be really boring.  Tiger Lily put us in a situation where we're at the back, but then showed where cameras were.  That way Tiger Lily could send information to Rose without being obvious or having to wait.  The cameras were perfect, and we had to look through pads, but even I got in on telling them some information. 

Though, I may have pushed it a bit far in some circumstances, but I couldn't help it.  They were so smug and it was clear that they were not taking us seriously at all.  It was actually rather off putting.  They asked questions about what our old home had claimed, but they didn't show any reactions to what Rose said.  Perhaps it was double talk and Rose would tell us how we really were doing when we met.  Say what they were sure of and if we were winning them over if we needed to convince them to let us go.

Go where would be the question.  But it would be terrible to go through this all just for it all of us to be killed anyway.

The situation was boring as anything.  So I might have interjected some stuff from my blog.  Not ideas, obviously, that wouldn't make sense.  But mostly what people had cottoned onto.  I had a little "favorite quotes" thing going on with fans.  And people tended to post certain ones time and time again.  I even thought I caught one on one of their news sites.  But I knew I was only fooling myself.  

"So," I asked, as we all sat together, "how did that go?"

"Horribly," said Amy with an exasperated sigh and she leaned against me. "They don't take us seriously at all."

I glanced at Tiger Lily, she nodded.

"I don't know how to go about this," said Rose with a deep sigh.  I looked at her in alarm and she just shrugged. "I'm being completely honest.  We need to find away to make this work with them or we are screwed."

"I think we're screwed either way," said Amy unhelpfully. "If we explain what we are they may then assume that we are completely untrustworthy and that we need to be eliminated."

"If we hide and they find out, they may think that this was an elaborate plan to sabotage them," said Tiger Lily, sitting next to me and looking at Amy disapprovingly. "Perhaps it is best to be honest with them about what our real function was.  It will at least get a reaction out of them."

Rose looked hard at Tiger Lily for a while.  Then she looked over at me, a sort of harassed defeated look graying her features. "What have you got for me Snow? Any information that you might have gleaned and just not given because it didn't seem important could help or at least shed light on this moment.  Do you know why they look down on prostitutes?  Is it like our own government and they're just stuffier.  Hell, I'd take the reason why you found some of them apparent shimmer to you."

"Oh," I said in shock, sitting up taller.  I knew I had written the reason down in one of my reports, but with the realization that Stephanie didn't even tell us that the government had been getting so close to destroying and getting rid of us, I wasn't that surprised she hadn't shared that information with Rose.  I didn't feel bad for not mentioning it, well, not much anyway. "Right, I told Stephanie," Rose glared at this, not interested in excuses, just interested in the information.  I coughed and hit the pad until I was at the profile I wanted and handed it to her.  She looked at it and then back to me. "What does it matter that one of their royalty owns so much and people are mad?"

"It's not what's in the article," I said while rolling my eyes. "Its who it's about.  Royalty meets us, and the owner of these has to meet us because of the amount of companies she owns."

"She?" asked Tiger Lily, picking up the important information right now.

"There never is any women at meetings with HSH," said Amy, comprehension lighting her eyes. She looked up at me. "Are you say..."

"The people who shimmer are women.  They hide it because they know that our government would see a place with women running things and doing political dances as both weak and untrustworthy.  So, they felt they had to disguise their women behind some cloaking technology they had invented."

"No wonder she always glares at us," said Amy, perking up and clapping her hands together. "That must have stung her poor sensitive pride."

"Amy," said Rose warningly, but Amy was much too happy with this little piece of information.  She was now happily humming to herself as she started to strip off her clothing, taking each piece from her body and throwing it into the air. 

"So, how does that change things?" asked Tiger Lily.

"I'll tell you when I work it through," said Rose, her mouth drawn as she looked inward.  Tiger Lily glanced at me, her mouth twisted into a hard frown.  We went back to what we had done before, and we only paused when Tiger Lily held up her hands and asked me to reflect.  I on random information I learned.  She then looked on the reports of people who had done this all from the other prostitute dressed in flowers in distasteful areas or tasteful, depending on where your mind decided to go. 

Both of them swore a little, the other girl talked way too loudly about who had decided not to listen and thought that they were very important or found something interesting.  I tried to disappear while I did some personal surfing . I read some of the stuff people had written about me and my work, and alright, that was horrible, I shouldn't have looked for myself, that's just self-centered.  But I justified it by pointing out that it gave me a confidence boost.

We went to another meeting.  I didn't hear or see anything different.  I did notice that, well, at least it didn't look like any of the officials noticed that Rose kept checking her pad and getting information.  She was doing it as slyly as one of the government officials wives, who hadn't come to this meeting because they thought she wasn't needed.  After all, whatever we were hiding didn't need someone with observation and analytical skills.  She could spend her time in the conferences over the phone with our home. 

How could these people be so stupid and blind?  They knew that women were smart, that they could sit in these meetings and conference with the best of us, but they choose not to acknowledge us as anything but a joke.  The only reason we seemed to be alive still was because while HSH was disgusted for us, they also pitied us.  They were keeping us alive until they actually found something dangerous about us or convinced our home to take us back because of who we were. 

It was really annoying, and I wondered if we still wanted these people to underestimate us.  At the moment, we offered nothing to these people.  We were seen as weak women who let men just walk all over us and while we were to be pitied, we were also supposed to be contemptible in many ways. 

"This isn't working," snapped Amy, getting right into Rose's face.  Rose drew herself higher, fingers clenched as she glared down her nose at Amy who was only centimeters from her face. "We know they're hiding something.  Why don't we confront them?"

"I don't think that's going to help," said Rose.  She leaned in and talked softly, though her anger made what she was saying carry a little. "They hate us if you hadn't noticed.  The women are the ones that we have the most trouble with and the ones saying we should just be taken care of.  Some saying it would be a kindness just to seal this room and poison us.  So forgive me if I don't want to irritate them and make them show their hand."

"Then what are we going to do?" asked Amy, almost yelling.

"Um," I said, shifting back and forth as they tried to glare each other down. "I might have one more thing, though I don't know if it's important."

"Anything could help." said Rose with a long sigh. Tiger Lily looked at me and I blushed.  I really didn't want to admit this.  It was my secret, the one I'd been able to keep. 

"I might be a little famous here," they looked at me, looking a little thrown.

"You mean in the hacking community?" asked Tiger Lily, pad at the ready to start taking those notes.  "I know that Stephanie made you actually have a name in the community to let them know we were something to take seriously, did you concentrate here first?  Is one of the people there a fan of yours?  Are you on speaking terms?"

"Uh, no," I admitted. "I'm completely socially inept on the internet."

"Unlike you are in person," said Rose dryly.  Amy punched her lightly on the shoulder, scowling, but I knew that she would have said it if Amy hadn't. 

"See, I don't even remember how it started, but I write this blog for these people. I didn't know who they were, and it took longer than it should have to realize they were from another house.  But see, I'm called the theorist," I said, and tried to think of the words to explain who I was.

"You're the theorist?" asked one of the prostitutes who had been pretending not to be paying attention to us. "They worship you."

I blushed.

"That's an exaggeration," I said.

"But it would explain why some of them look so thrown when Rose says by words what you say," said Tiger Lily. "Why didn't you say something sooner?"

"Because I'm really not that much of a big deal," I said with a sigh. "It's just an interest piece by a girl who rambles on without any real reason and who some people take way too seriously."

"So, should we tell them?" asked Amy, looking at Rose.  Rose just stared at me.

"I don't think offering them Snow will do anything," said Rose, her gaze unwavering. Amy sighed, throwing up her arms in exasperation. "They won't believe us if we just come out and say it.  We've been open about the girls looking things up on the internet.  They'll just think that we're being dishonest."

"Then what?  We're going to do nothing?  Like what we did with Jen's other revelation?" asked Amy angrily.

"No, we should be more transparent," said Tiger Lily.  Rose looked at her with a thin glare.  Tiger Lily just looked back, this had been what she had been pushing for the whole time. "We start by giving them hints.  It would seem weird, and none of us would feel comfortable just telling them our second skill set.  But if we give them hints, let them see what we might have actually been brought along for, and put Snow White in the front of it all, maybe we can start making those connections."

"And how do we do that?" asked Rose, and then she actually bent her head and held her hand for silence.  That was some mixed signals, but we all waited.  Rose then tapped her mic, making the room buzz with a high pitched noise that everyone could hear, but some people continued talking to.  Rose hit the mic again, and people held their ears and glared around, daring those people to keep talking.

"Alright, new plan.  We can't survive this pretending to just be prostitutes.  We have to show these people that we have something to offer them and that our government turned against us because they were intimidating by a bunch of women who didn't mind being a little sexual also being smart and useful.  So we're going to start showing them.  Wear what is comfortable, and if you can have some other part of your trade visible.  If you're a guard, it's you weapon, if you observe, let them see you doing it. 

"Just so there's no confusion though.  We are not telling them anything, we are simply giving them hints to set the ground work.  Also, know that Amy will be wearing clothes, so comfortable does not mean indecent, stick to their rules, but also know Jen will be wearing her lounge wear.  If you don't know what that means, come see me in fifteen minutes and we'll show you," Rose clicked her mic off as the whispers started in earnest.

"What do you mean I can't go naked?" asked Amy with her pout, though it was clear she wasn't really serious.  Rose still glared at her and got into her personal space.

"You running around naked is only going to cause a distraction and make them think that we're disrespectful of both ourselves and them," snapped Rose.

"But Jen takes me more seriously when I'm not wearing clothes," Amy claimed.  I looked at the other woman like she had gone insane.  That was not true, how in the world had she gotten that impression.

"That is because you act more seriously and in control without clothes on," said Tiger Lily. "But Rose is right, you walking around naked will distract them because they're attracted to you whether they want to admit it or not." Amy rolled her eyes and reached for me, but Tiger Lily pulled me away from her and gave me my bag. "You brought your casual clothes, right?"

I nodded.  It took a while to find them.  I had to really get my hands inside and look through even the food I had before I got to my clothes.  It felt so nice to get everything on again.  I had missed the feeling of cloth completely covering my body.  I sent a quick text to Lisa, who appeared from where she had been hanging out while all of us had been busy, and she played with my hair.  I knew it would hurt later, it was down a lot now, and Lisa was hanging out and pulling my hair for a long time when she would finish by putting all of it into a bun that would go under my hat. 

Actually, she didn't even secure it, doing what I usually did by just rolling most of my hair and catching it with my hat.  We didn't get to talk because I still needed to stay on the alert and hacking my way through everything I could.  It turned out that a lot of things, well, more than I expected, had to be worked manually.  They made sense, like the doors coming in, the prison cells, things like that where a hacker coming in and opening or changing something would be a major problem. 

When we were called again, I snapped my computer shut and looked around.  We were ready.  Uncomfortable, and some people had followed the orders or at least they understood them better than some.  The fact most people didn't have clothes that screamed "prostitute" made sense seeing as even back at home some people didn't ever really leave our living courters except on the remote chance, but others still looked like their normal selves.  Though, that could be because while being a guard was easy enough to show discretely, others were hard to show without telling or at least giving some hints verbally.

I tried to go in the middle as we went in, because really I didn't want to go to the front.  But Tiger Lily stopped me and I compromised by sitting down in the front row, Tiger Lily sitting next to me, setting up our camera pads for those we couldn't see while sitting down and taking out her own pad and already starting to write. 

As I got comfortable, I noticed that it seemed like no one was paying us any new attention.  As the other government officials sat down they either were absorbed talking on their phones or to each other, and there was no body language that showed fear from noticing weapons or lingering glances at the girl near the front in the very conservative clothing.  When I reviewed the messages, I learned that while some noticed, they still thought I was catering to some sort of kink and thus were very dismissive or even angry that we thought we could get in their good graces by showing one girl who was really a pervert.

"If only they knew," said Amy with a sigh.

"Some people would consider a lack of interest in sex perverted," said Tiger Lily.

"You made that up," said Amy, Tiger Lily shook her head and went back to work.  Amy grunted and fell back to the floor while muttering about stupid people.

"Shit," I whispered under my breath.

"What is it?" demanded Rose from right behind me.  I jumped a little in surprise and then blushed.

"Um, well, you see I think things just got worse," I said, and leaned sideways and waved my hand for Rose to read. "A lot of the emails seem to share her sentiment."

Rose swore.

"Did we intimidate them?  Did they decide that our home did have a legitimate reason to get rid of us?  Are we going to be sealed in and gassed?" asked Amy, trying to look over Rose's shoulder.

"No, they seem to think even less of us now," said Rose, "They noticed Snow but only to think we're worse perverts and completely incompetent, and didn't notice the weapons at all."

"How?" asked Amy. "Not that they're the most observant, but they're generally not completely idiotic.  They should have realized something."

"They can tell we're tense, which is just that they're worried we'll  do something stupid," said Amy and shook her head. 

"Well, hopefully they'll get it eventually as we continue negotiations," said Rose.


	11. Escaping Freedom

"They're going to kill us," I said.  It had been two days of getting nowhere.  Rose had even started to stop using inflections of tone and vocabulary and tried to talk to the officials without acting at all like she had no clue.  She was straight, talked straight, and debated, and they still treated her like she was poison to every single one of them.  Now the order had basically been given.  We had one more meeting to plead our case and then we were going to be taken care of.

Tiger Lily came to the same conclusion, and Rose, Amy, and Clincy soon agreed.  There was some debate whether we should just assume that like me HSH were stupid or at least really thick and needed things spelled out for them.  But in the end they looked to me and the engineers to get us free. 

They debated and finally I showed them my last blog and the code I had written for it.

"The only problem is that I need to get to this room to get it done," I said, and when Rose looked at me I took a deep breath and detailed my ideas on how to do it.  They listened and immediately started working on it.  Lisa smiled at it, there for once as she pushed my sides and then gave me a hard hug. Whispering I had done well.  I guessed the reason they were starting with my idea was because I had most of the information even if I did try to keep them in the loop. 

Of course things changed, they changed drastically, though a lot of what I needed to do was left almost alone.  Though I did get someone with me.  An engineer.  There was some debate because while Wren was best all around, what needed to be done here was actually in another girl's best to do it.  The only problem, they worried about my own mental connections and then that girl freaked.  Because no matter how much we talked, there was a good chance that I would end up dead.

Of course, it turned out that Paul was rather very helpful.  So we all took our parts.  I snuck out early, my pad at my fingers.  Wren came with me, not for my mental state, but because the girl we picked freaked out over what we choose.  The hardest part, on both our ends, would be getting our guys to safety.  But I was just distracting myself.  By hacking our way through the corridors and the fact that both of were dressed conservatively as finding something great for her. 

Of course, someone had to know who we were as we got closer.

"Well, if isn't our little prostitutes, how did you get so far away from home?" asked the man.  He was young, in his early thirties, and he definitely thought in the same line as the rest of them. "You shouldn't be here."

"We were looking for some fun," said Wren.

"Oh?" he said, his glance sliding from her to me.  He sauntered over to me, put his hands on my chin. "I suppose with no men around you must have been lost."

"Oh yes," said Wren, who then jumped and then smiled as the man who apparently come from the room we wanted to go into left his post for a little fun. "Please, before we go back, can't we find a nice place to have a little fun."

"I'm not sure," said the first man.  Apparently willing to tease us, but not ready to do anything that would put his people at risk.  Apparently they took us a little seriously.

"How about just a quick one in the office," said the second man, nuzzling Wren's neck.  The man who was slowly letting his hands sink from me looked a little hesitant.  I took it into my own hands and put them on my body.  I put the hands on my body, trying to let him feel what was beneath the clothes, while trying to keep my look as shyly seductive as I could.

"Well, I suppose this couldn't go too wrong," said the man.  I smiled and pulled him in.  Wren kept saying something, but I was too intent on not attacking too soon.  The man's hands were everywhere and going to some uncomfortable areas that would usually having me attack without thought. I held in though until I had what I needed to attack, and so did Wren.

"What does it mean to you that you give in and hide your women?" I whispered in his ears.  The man's hand froe on my body and I struck out.  Hitting the buzz against his side so that he shivered and convulsed under me.  I watched him fall into oblivion, his body continuing to shiver.  But he wasn't dead, so while I got myself set in and sent the go ahead to everyone else, Wren wrapped up.

Then I got to work. There were hiccups, and at one time Wren broke into tears as a few guards were killed.  But they got it right, everyone, well, almost everyone got out.  They even got the guys along the way and they were driving with that Samantha chick who knew the controls out into the desert.  Both Wren and I relaxed.  We shared a look before turning with our backs to the door that was going broken at any moment.  There was a good chance that they would just shoot.  We would be dead, and so would the men we'd cornered.  I had to wonder what would have happened if there were more than two.  One had been the ideal, two had been alright, but more than that... we had a plan, but it could have very quickly gone wrong and gotten all of us killed in an instance.

"We have you surrounded," said a very female, very familiar voice.  I was almost tempted to turn around, but held my ground.

"Aia!" shouted the man who tried to get to me.  The two men had been awake for a while.  They had been shockingly easy to tune out.  I didn't remember a word they'd said, though they had been shouting for a while, I did remember that.  It was basically just cursing and telling us what would happen once their friends got to us.

"I wouldn't shoot," said Wren, sounding bored and challenging. You shoot and your boys are dead and as many of you as we can take.

"You think you can take any of us?" asked the woman.  I looked to see what was reflected back at me from the cameras above us.  There were at least ten men that I could see at the door, probably more behind them.  All with very serious looking guns.

"No," I said easily.

"But if you shoot, your boys will die," said Wren.  Aia looked furious.  It was an interesting look for her.  While she glared and bitched about us on the net and under her man shimmer, in general she was known to always have a diplomatic smile and a cool head.

We really did bring the worst out in her. 

"Listen which of you is in charge?" asked Aia.

"Neither of us," said Wren. "She made it out with the rest.  We were just here to be the hacker and the techie.  I'm the techie, Theorist here is the hacker."

There was a silence. "I would remember if any of the prostitutes had that as a handle," snapped Aia. "You're just calling her that because of what it means to our people."

We hadn't planned on this, but if Wren was going to adlib instead of just downloading the program, then I could join in.

"Yes and no," I said, I saw Aia look at the back of my chair and I turned around, giving her a smile as I did so. "After all, we aren't acting as stupid, airheaded prostitutes," though when I said this I glanced at the boys. "Not at this moment at least. No we're doing our actual jobs."

And alright, Aia might be pissed off at us, but I was pissed off Aia.  Really, did she have to be so obnoxious?  Did she have to fall for the image we'd projected so completely.  I would almost be rather at the Rose Petal House than here.  I was going to let her know exactly why she should have been worried about letting us in.  Not because we could corrupt the minds of those we came in contact with.  Made prostitution something dirty and horrible and hurt men and women with our beliefs.  They should have worried we were trained plants put in to destroy them, to kill with our guards, taken them apart with the engineers, and their histories laid bare by our spies, observers and of course me. 

"And if you were the Theorist, how could someone of your mind end up working like this?" demanded Aia.  She was, after all, my biggest fan. "How would anyone who was competent at what you seem to be claiming be what you are.  You can't tell me your officials actually took you seriously."

"No, that's why they tried to kill us," said Wren and then shrugged. "And I got in through desperation.  You need a paper to do what I love officially."

"Blackmail," I said, and then smiled at her. "Really if you wanted me to stay on the straight and narrow, you should have paid me more.  That money barely paid for food."

"You can't be," she said.

"Check your email," I said, nodding to her like I knew she had her pad on her.  The woman's fist tightened. 

"If you are a hacker, than you could have easily faked giving me that," she snapped.

"But you're the expert," I said with a smirk. "You always say you know when it's me who has written and not some other hacker.  And you always knew I was a hacker if your emails are anything to go by.  Sorry, once I knew who you were I couldn't help but look it over."

Aia just glared, looking like she was about to explode.  I sighed and turned around. 

"Very well," I said, and I hit the button.  I glanced over to see Wren looking away, her chair still facing away from Aia and her soldiers.  Wren also was looking very confused and shocked. My face appeared. "I know it's a little different but I did a video blog instead of just writing this time.  You have a written one if you don't want to publish this."

I continued to ramble in the background and they just watched.  I didn't need to see or hear when Amy came into the frame.  Aia's face twisted and she came out of her shock.  Then she started to get that look that she doubted what she was seeing. 

"She's just a whore Aia, don't let her fool you," said my guy.

"Did I hurt your feelings?" I asked, looking at him sharply.  Wren snorted. 

"You are a..."

"Shut up Ry," sneered Aia.  I looked over at her and cut her off before she made more complaints.

"Just so you know.  I didn't just show you, I showed everyone that had a pad or electronic that played video," I paused and pretended to look sad. "Sorry about the kids I guess.  Anyway, I see you're getting anxious, so you should also know that there was a virus in there.  It was hard to make and actually do what it's supposed to, after all, you are all so careful about keeping the important stuff all locked up."

"What are you talking about?" asked Aia.

"And of course you could try to hack into my electronics, computers, and pads to find out all about it, and you could try to torture the information from me, but that won't lead to much as you won't get that far," I said, somehow pulling off smug and in control as I did.  Actually, this felt really good.  I shouldn't like it as much as I should, but that was how life went. "So, you're move."

"What do you want?" asked Aia.

"You don't even know what she did!" snapped my guy.

"There is one important part of all homes that keeps us safe.  It keeps us from what has changed everything else.  Keeps our air clean," said Aia.  I gave her a little nod. "What do you want?"

"A car out for the two of us," said Wren. "Let me check it for any unwanted and we'll be out of your hair.  Off to wherever our people went.  Don't worry about that, we have our own tracker."

"Your people killed our men, good men," said Aia.

"You were going to kill us," I snapped back. "And your men killed some of our guards, good guards."

Alright, I wasn't being very subtle or kind.  And I definitely wasn't make any friends.  But this really had gone on long enough, and since the system was in place, we really were working a short fuse.

"Fine," she said finally.  I looked at Wren.  She shrugged.  I wondered if she was thinking what we were thinking.  That we were dead in seconds.  She threw them the button that would kill the guys.  One of the soldiers got it and went for the guys, seemingly knowing what it was.  When they came close to me, I showed them my button.  They froze, I just took it off and handed it to them. 

I flung my bag over my shoulders and let the soldiers lead us out.  I was sure that we would end up in some interrogation or torture room.  Somehow I felt calm though. I idly scratched out my passwords with what was called a magnet pen on the back of my pad. 

Aia was with us the whole time as we boarded an elevator and went down , down , down.

"You know, if you ask nicely, Jen might take a tumble with you," I wanted to smack my hand against my face.  I glared over at Wren but she looked unconcerned and even playful. 

"Who, what?" asked Aia, I sighed, continuing to write.

"Wren is saying that you can have sex with me if you ask nicely," I said, then flipped over my pad and started working something's to finish up before we left. I gave Wren a serious look. "And I think this might not be the time."

"I thought you were only a prostitute because you were blackmailed," said Aia, looking over at me.

"Yeah, but if having sex with you keeps us from dying, well, what do you think miss Royalty miss?  You want to have some fun with Snow White?" asked Wren with a smile.

"Snow White?  Like the one who only has sex with girls?" asked one of the soldiers.  I briefly wondered if all these men were what they seemed.

"Ignore her," I snapped. "And after I have sex which the idea of seems to worry Aia, not calm her, she could easily kill me after we had fun?"

"I can't believe you're the Theorist.  From the little you'd said we all thought you were either asexual or something along those lines," said Aia.

"She's weird sexual," said Wren and then fell silent when I glared at her.

"Well, we're here," said Aia with a strong sigh.  We were both ready for a short life filled with pain, getting ready as best we could for that moment it started.  Instead we were looking at cars. "You get the smallest one."

They led us down to the dark parts and started looking through everything that we could find.  Wren did most of the work while I listened on how to use the machine.  Unfortunately the one person who could figure it out, was the one who went with the group.  The machine we got was about as big as an old fashioned car, which meant that inside there was hardly enough room for the two of us. 

"Well, this is goodbye," said Aia as we were getting ready to leave. I handed her my pad.  She took it looking at me in confusion.

"Do with it whatever you want, but on the back has some of my more frequently used passwords.  It will get you into our Homes a way, your hackers should be able to work with it.  Plus, it has all my mad ramblings I didn't give to you.  Don't know if anyone will want to read them anymore after my little show, but you won't get any blogs from where I'll probably end up so..." I shrugged and got in the car, hitting the button to lock it down.  "Oh, and once you log in, you'll see somewhere to write the numbers written on the bottom of the pad in the front.  It will fix your air problem."

The car shut with Wren laughing behind me and we were off. 

I quickly learned that I hated cars.  It's one thing to read about them before a mission, to learn about them obsessively because they're interesting.  Getting behind it was completely terrifying.  The thing bumped along as it dug its wheels into the sand.  The landscape was bare and the only thing that let me know that we weren't going to be going into oblivion was Wren who talked over a headset about where we were going based on where our friends cars had been.

By the time we got to the forest, I was thankful to have not run into any animals because just keeping the thing going the right way was hard.  When we got in the forest, while there was a path, this car was obviously not made to make it.  We jumped all over the place, almost being flown into the air. 

Then we really couldn't go further, but that was okay, because when we got out of the car, we met our friends.  I can't be too detailed, because the world went white and I fell into the arms of my best friends.  I think I fainted.

We apparently living there for a while.  The big car was being used as a living area until they got it setup.  But it was amazing.  I looked around at everything I had ever missed by living in our home and just breathed the air in.

"Come on wimp," said Lisa, I could feel her next to me as she nudged me. "Sit up and see the view.  It's gorgeous."

"Not a wimp, was awesome," I said, but I opened my eyes.  At first I thought she meant the trees, because they really were pretty, especially how the light filtered through the green. I might have seen them while on my way over, but it's different when you're not in a roaring deathtrap.  Now I could just lie back and let it all sink in. The smells were amazing, so rich.  I never really thought of home as smelling of anything.  I thought it was just a natural smell unless you got something else to plug in, but I know it never smelled like this because there was just so much coming at me all at once.

Arms wrapped behind me and pulled me up, drawing out a groan of irritation as I was propped.  I would have glared at Lisa, my muscles felt like butter beaten for a week for some reason, when I saw the waterfall.  It was like my ears had just been turned on, and I wondered how I hadn't heard the roar of water before, or the gentle lapping on the shore I was propped on.  I took another deep breath in. 

They said that the air would kill you out here.  Slowly but surely eat at you until you weren't human anymore.  Most animals had adapted to it, and maybe we could have to if the conspiracy theories of the time had been right and it had been humans to create the shift. 

"Rose says we're not going to die," said Amy, coming to sit next to me and giving me a bar. "Well, at least if we can figure out a way to test what is edible and what isn't before we put it into our mouths.  The air isn't toxic, it just changes people."

"It's why a lot of construction workers lose their jobs and hide in the basement.  Mutations," said Lisa. "I just thought they got loosey doctors or went insane."

"That isn't how mutations are supposed to work," said Tiger Lily.  Already sitting down.  I looked at her pad and she smiled. "This car works and is charged on solar.  So we've got charging power at least until the hunk of metal fails us."

"So we're going to live here?" I asked.

"Safest bet," said Amy.  I looked over it and took a deep breath in.  It tasted and smelled so good.  So rich and textured and in some ways I was so happy because my lungs would hate it if I went back to filtered air.

Amy smirked, her clothing sparse and probably more because the ground was uncertain and she needed her shoes which thankfully were not heels.  She leaned in for a kiss and I stopped her.  We stared at each other, and I think we had the same thought.  That we weren't going to be intimate anymore.  I wasn't interested, and Amy wasn't willing to lose me as a friend just because I wouldn't fuck, she had other friends and people for that.

Instead she stood and stretched. Lisa and Tiger Lily stood too. 

"Come on Jen.  We've rested enough and it's time to get some work done," said Lisa, holding out her hand to me.  I smiled and took it, letting her help me up before they led me to where Rose was organizing people to see to that we survived and didn't slowly starve and be killed off in this new environment.  None of us really knew what we were doing.  But for once that didn't seem to matter.  For once though I knew my skill set had nothing to do with what we needed to build and set up a life here, I felt I wasn't going to be a burden.

And with that in mind, with fresh air running through my lungs, I got to work. 

**Theorist's Blog**

**(written transcript of video blog)**

Hello all, if you can't tell, I'm the Theorist.  Bit of a letdown, I know, apparently I'm supposed to be some scrawny nerd behind a computer with lofty ideas.  Well, I am a nerd with a computer, but it's you guys that think I'm worth something.

Which is why I'm contacting you now.  This is definitely a departure from the norm.  I mean, usually I just ramble with half a topic in mind, but today I got one, and it's one I think warrants me saying it in public.  See, I obviously don't just do this for a job, I got another one, and well, it brought me here.  Yeah, I'm in Home Sweet Home or Neverlast if you're a hacker like me.  Which yeah, since I'm obviously here and admitting I'm a hacker, I'm dead.  And oddly enough, you can totally blame my boss.  But I'm not dead for the right reasons, 'cause you see...

 **Naked Chick:** What are you doing?

 **Theorist:** A blog, I told you I'm a bit of a celebrity around here.

 **Naked Chick:** You think she's going to put it up when she knows what your job is?

 **Theorist:** No, I'm going to put it up. See people, this is how it is, I'm actually a prostitute.  Make of that whatever you want.  But where I'm from that's an illegal job only the depraved do, which some of you think, but most of you don't.  And that's really what is going to get me killed.  Not the prostitute stuff, the whole we're from a place that looks down on people who do this job and thus are not wanted here.  Forget that for the last week we've been trying to show that we acted as more as prostitutes.  Not that that mattered.  Our home still tried to kill us because we could do what they thought a prostitute shouldn't and it got on their nerves.

 **Naked Chick:** I think you're getting off topic.

 **Theorist:** Right, I usually do, but at least I'm being coherant.  I least I think I am.  Anyways.  I just want to give you an idea of who I have been writing about these last few months.  Or whose story inspired my blog pieces.

**Theorist takes camera and pans around room of girls in various bright costumes that show off indecent skin.**

**Theorist:** No idea what you will make of this.  But all I want to say is goodbye.  Try to actually see the people who are around you for what they are, and have a wonderful life being who you are to the best of your ability.

 **Naked Chick:** Unless you killed us.  In that case you can...

**End of blog.**


End file.
